Old Framiliar Faces
by Flecher and Friend
Summary: Its been a year since we closed the Kira case, but what should I do now? Somehow I get the feeling that I'm falling apart. I find myself in an unfamiliar place surrounded by strange people, and everything just seems to be getting weirder and weirder.
1. Chapter 1

**Authors Note: This story is actually a combined piece by both me and pen name Arramidnight. **

For some they have died,

and some they have left me.

And some are taken from me;

all are departed;

All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.

-Charles Lamb

I shuffled down the hall to the elevator of my apartment building. Even a year later it still felt wrong to go to work and run my life in the same way that I would have as if nothing had happened. Not only that but everyone seemed to have this need to get over it, but why should we act like it didn't effect us how could it have not? The elevator rang at each floor causing it to move monotonously slow as it neared the bottom floor. I walked to the train station looking at all the people waiting with me. The same people that were there everyday. My stop came faster than I would have liked, normally this wouldn't have phased me, in fact at some point in my life I was excited to be working the reflective glass skyscraper that was now looming in front of me. The NPA headquarters, the ending place of painfully mundane daily commute. I followed the stream of other business attire clad people flowing in the mostly empty entry hall. Suddenly I stopped, the room still moved around me, but somehow I couldn't make myself continue into the over packed elevators with everyone else. It was at this moment that it dawned on me, as though I'd walked into an over scrubbed pane of glass.

I really can't do this.

I waited a moment before regaining enough self composure to walk the five feet to the main desk in the center of the room. A secretary was looking down at piece of paper to the side of her computer while she typed quickly. I glanced over her name plate, Kashimora Kana, there were little silver stars surrounding her names interesting what little things could say about a person. I leaned against the desk allowing her to finish before looking up. She jolted ever so slightly when she realized I was there, brown glitter lined eyes lite up automatically.

"Sorry I totally didn't see you there sir. Good morning." Kana said with a surprisingly sincere smile.

"Good morning." I said. "Would you mind if I borrowed a piece of paper."

"Sure of course you can." She handed me a yellow legal pad and heavy sliver pen. I quickly scribbled down a note.

Hi

I'm quiting the force

say good bye to everyone for me

bye

Matsuda

I tore the page off placing the pen and pad back down on the desk in front of me.

"Would you mind bring this up to Aizawa." I said showing her the paper.

"Do you mean the Director?" I nodded, duh she wouldn't refer to him by name, she'd probably never even talked to him. " Then sure I'll get it up there as soon as I can get away from the desk. Will that be soon enough" I folded the paper before handing it to her.

"Yeah that would be great. Thank you." I said turning back towards the exits.

"Leaving all ready." Kana asked brightly. I turned back and smiled at her cheerfully.

"Yep I was just stopping by, I have the day off actually." I walked against the flow of traffic, navigating the other workers until I was back in the train station which was just as overly crowded as it was before, a suffocating number of people moving in every direction around me. What was arriving soonest? I scanned the electronic arrival board for what would be there with in minutes. Gate 13 to Tokyo International. The airport. Somewhere in my subconscious I knew it made no sense to head aimlessly in a random direction, but I pushed the thought aside and hurried to the gate. I sank to a bench, ignoring the strange stares of other travelers who were all trudging along with rolling luggage and duffel bags who seemed to find my lack of either item to be odd. I forced my eyes to the window watching the dark tunnel walls speed by, I would get there soon where ever there might be.

The last stop was outside the airport arrival and departure. As I entered the main terminal it became evident that I didn't know where to start, there were rows of desks for many different airlines none of which I felt any draw towards. I shuffled to the information desk. There was a slight line but much shorter then all the other desks so it was the obvious choice of where to start. When I got to the front of the line there was a man standing behind the desk looking completely miserable sending a glare at the couple who had just left.

"Hey you." He said. "How can I help you?"

"I need a flight." I said.

"Excuse me?" He raised an eyebrow skeptically.

"I need a flight." I repeated.

"Where to? At what time? I really need more information to help you."

"I really don't care where, I just need the first flight out of here."

"Well can I have your name?"

"Oh yeah, my name is Touta Matsuda."

"Do you have an ID or something?" I nodded handing him my ID. "How about a passport?" I shock my head. "So you need to fly somewhere in Japan?"

"No I need to leave Japan."

"You can't do that."

"No you really don't understand. I have things, things that I need to do. Things that I need to do that are not in Japan." Rambling, I'm rambling at this man. But it was important I didn't leave now, if I did I wouldn't come back and at this moment I all that I had to do was get away from everything that I knew.

"I'm sorry, what do you want me to do?"

"Get me the first flight out of here."

"But you can't leave the country." He said clearly trying to show me reason, but I knew there had to be a way that I could do the same for him.

"But..."

"Sir I think you need to think about this. Clearly this trip wasn't very well planned..."

"No." I said thinking about my options. "I'm... Its police stuff... I have to leave for police business." I pulled out my badge waving it erratically in front of me. "Its an emergency you see." I said gaining some steam as my lie started to sound more believable and valid. "Super important stuff I have to do."

"Really?" He looked over the badge. "Is there someone I can check this with."

"Yes." I said that quickly realized that there probably wasn't and corrected myself. "Actually no."

"Yes or no?" He rolled his eyes clearly he was gonna start doubting me soon.

"Umm yes. Yes you can." The words tumbling out.

"I'm going to need that number."

"Can I talk to them quickly." The man made a face like he was going to say no, for obvious reasons... "Listen the mission is really secret and there are only very few people who know about it. So I need to talk to them if there going to give you clearance, but this is really an emergency and it is a matter of national security that I get on a flight... Any flight... If you really need me to call the head of the NPA and have him confirm it I can, but that would really make things take longer so please just help." The man was staring at me clearly trying to decide if he believed me or not. In all honesty I wouldn't blame him for not, any other day I would have thought I was the most suspicious person on this earth. But looks can be deceiving, I also knew from experience that even the most trust worthy can be hiding things so why wouldn't the idea work inversely.

"Fine you can call." He sighed waving a exhausted hand at me, the line was building up and he knew just as well as me that it was better to just let things move along so that I didn't back things up much longer.

"Okay, you won't be sorry." I pulled out my cell phone and dialed Aizawa's office with shaking hands.

"Where the hell are you Matsuda!?" He shot through the phone, pleasant as always it would be hard to convince him to say what I needed, but I would just have to choose my words correctly.

"You haven't gotten my note." Please say..

"No. What are you talking about!?" Thank goodness for little miracles!

"Nothing, nope nothing, um... But I'm having some trouble at the moment. This person at the airport isn't letting me use my badge as ID."

" And just why are you at the airport when you should be at work?" Aizawa let out a frustrated sigh from the other line. Think man...

"I'm... just a second." I said to the man at the desk moving away slightly to make sure was able to see me talking, but was unable to hear what the conversation was about. "I was away for the weekend remember." I said completely lying through my teeth.

"No... Why don't you have ID with you?" As always he sound exasperated by my very being.

"Its a really long story, but if you want me to get back you just have to tell this man that I work for the NPA and you need him to let me get on the plane right now."

"Really, only you could get yourself into this kind of situation I swear..." He muttered.

"Please Aizawa..." I was truly grabbing at straws at the moment, but just maybe...

"Fine, put him on the phone." I let out a sigh of relief.

"Thank you so much!" I said turning back to the desk and the glaring man waiting for me. "Here." I handed the phone over. I heard them exchange several questions then he handed it back.

"I'm looking for the next flight." The man told me clicking the keys on his computer with practiced speed. I put the phone back to my ear.

"Be here soon okay?" He snapped.

"Yeah." I said feeling sorry to be lying, after the years working in the task force there was part of me that cared about the other members... "Tell everyone I'll miss them alright?" I managed knowing just how strange the comment would sound to someone who thought they would be seeing me in a few hours tops.

"What are you babbling about Matsuda?" He sounded like he was going to make me explain myself, but I cut in before he could say anything more.

"Bye." I slammed the end button keeping my finger on it until the screen feel dark.

"There is a flight to Portland Oregon. Hows that?" I nodded.

"Thats fine, I mean perfect, yep thats totally great." I smiled sure I was twitching, but at least I was soon going to be on my way.

"Alright." The man said begrudgingly. "I'll walk you to the gate or else there is no way that you would get through security." He lead me away from the desk and through a side passage. He stopped to talk in a hushed voice to a woman at the metal detector who signaled me through. We reached the gate , the plane, which was mostly boarded. The man from the desk talked to another man who was taking tickets. He waved us into the boarding tunnel. Apparently he was to dropped me off once I was actually on the plane and not before. "Your seat is right there." He pointed to a spot in the first class section, ironic it would be my first time here, I thought with a laugh internally.

I walked over to the place the man had indicated. A woman sitting in the seat next to mine. She was young, probably only in her early twenties, and was curled up catlike in her seat. She was a foreigner with swept back blond hair and many dangling earrings. She was fiddling with the frayed holes in the knees of her jeans and on her hooded sweatshirt.

"Hey there" She said in a bubbly way.

"Hi." I said sitting down, she stopped moving her fingers wide blue eyes looking me with a quick glance, than she smiled toothily.

"I'm Rose Jenkins." She held out her hand to me in a friendly way.

"Touta Matsuda." I said oddly grateful to be greeted so enthusiastically by a complete stranger. Maybe it was a good omen.

"What brings you this way?" She asked. "Business? You look like a business person to me."

"Nope not business. I'm moving." I said sinking to the seat, rolling my neck against the rough gray seat and breathing in the smell of recycled air.

"Really? What made you choose Portland." She turned in her seat so that we were facing one another.

"Well actually I didn't really." I admitted with a shrug. "I guess Portland choose me in a way."

"How philosophical of you." I made a confused face, was she making fun of me? "No I totally understand that is exact same reason that I moved to Peoria." she reassured me.

"Wheres that?"

"I really don't have any idea to be totally honest. I heard a story on like NPR or something about this person who moved to Peoria because god told them to do it."

"God didn't tell me to move. I just needed a change and this was the first flight out of here at the moment I arrived." I said looking at the ground sullenly.

"Sorry I didn't mean to poke fun or anything like that." She placed a hand on my armrest in heartfelt way.

"Its alright. I'm pretty used to it."

"Sad." She said. "But really I wouldn't have made fun of you if by some chance you had been looking for god." I laughed at least I was sitting next to someone friendly.

Pretty soon the plane had taken off and was beginning to level out at cruising altitude .

"So..." Rose started.

"Do you always talk this much to random strangers on planes?" I asked looking up from my copy of the stupid magazine selling things that are always placed in planes.

"Nope. You just look like you need help." Thats a weird thing to tell someone after less then an hour of knowing one another.

"I don't need help, but thank you." I tried to turn back but...

"Sure you do. Wheres all your stuff?" Great I was really obviously out of place, but I guess I had already realized that.

"Don't have any." I said looking down at the the suit I was wearing, the only clothes I would have with me when I got to America, at least I had my wallet and stuff so I wouldn't be completely broke. Though money was never endless, I would have to find something else to do...

"Okay sorry my mistake your doing fine." She turned to the window, but I could see her looking back at me.

"Okay, okay, maybe I'm not doing so great but I'm doing fine." She swiveled excitedly to face me once again, clearly glad to know she had figured me out so fast.

"Where are you going to live in Portland?"

"I don't know?" I answered honestly, I don't know why I felt like it didn't matter if I told her, but than again I wasn't really sure why I was doing a lot of things as of late.

"The housing market is kinda high over there at the moment." She said.

"I'll find something." Nerves were starting to set in now, with the plane in the air there was no turning back even if I wanted to and with what she was saying taken totally to heart.

"Can I help?" Did she really just say what I thought she did?

"You want to help me? Sure."

"I know a guy." She smiled widely bearing her teeth again.

"You know a guy?" I reiterated.

"Yeah. I know a guy who owns a building. You'd have at least one roommate, but I've met him and hes fine. Kinda old, but a nice guy as far as people go you know? So anyway its like dirt cheap." She ripped a page out of sky mall and scribbled down a phone number.

"Thanks. I'm not going to call this number and end up calling you or something right?"

"Oh you found me out." She said. "Hell no I don't give my phone number to strange men in airplanes. Do people really try that?"

"Dunno." I noticed the stewardess heading down the isle with the food cart.

"The service here sucks." Rose said. "I fly with them all the time and the stewardesses totally hate me."

"Really they hate you?" I had never known airline staff to be rude, at least not outwardly, to anyone in any of my many times on planes.

"Yes they do, you'll see." She said indicating for me to turn back to the other woman.

"Maybe its 'cause you talk so much." I laughed.

"I really don't talk this much when I travel. I told you that you just seem like you might need a friend is all."

"I have friends." Maybe, though who really knew if that was true or not anymore.

"Thats not what I meant. I mean that you look sad and I just want to help cheer you up." The stewardess stopped next to us smiling forcedly.

"Can I get you something to drink sir?" She asked.

"A coffee." I said. Rose laughed as the woman pushed the cart away after handing me the coffee.

"Told you she hates me." Rose said.

"Wow she kinda does. Coffee?" I held up the cup.

"No I'm good." She said reaching into her pocket. "I bring my own snacks. Granola?" She held out a small bag. I shock my head never having been much for that sorta snack.

"Did you take that out of your pocket?"

"Yeah so. Its your loss. Talk to me again in like six hours when they try and feed. Its growl and bites I swear to you."

The rest of flight went as pleasantly as a fourteen hour plane ride could possibly be. Rose continued talking to me periodically. It helped keep me from lapsing into full boredom, without any entertainment with me, plus she was a huge help in calming me down and cheering me up.

The plane landed through a mass of gray clouds and onto a slick runway. Storms and rain, a good start already. When we got off the plane we had to go through customs. Thankfully the airport had called ahead so they let me through or else I had no real plan how that was going to work.

"Your very important apparently." Rose said as we were let out near the badge claim area where most of the other passengers from our flight were all filing to the assigned carousel. She walked with me to the door.

"Don't you have a bag?" I asked noticing that she hadn't gone in the mass of people either.

"Nope. Don't you?"

"No." I shrugged.

"So, I guess it was nice to meet you." She said holding out a hand with a smile, I shook smiling back at her. It had been, well interesting that was for sure at least she was nice.

"You too." She waved walking away without another word. Leaving me by myself again. At that moment I realized just how alone I really was, and the severity of the situation. I didn't know anyone in Portland, I'd never even heard of the place. Without a single rational thought I had brought myself half way across the world, but for what really? Something had drawn me away from my life and clearly meant for me to here at this moment. But really what it all came down to was what to now that I was here? With as much resolve as I could muster I moved in behind a crowd of people and filed out the door.


	2. Chapter 2

**Note: I would be great if you could review, I'd love the feed back.**

** Just a side note I know that there are a lot of original charters being introduced, but bare with me they are needed for the plot and not just stupid love interests.**

I took my phone out of my pocket and turned it back on for the first time since the airport in Tokyo. I had missed many calls, go figure. I'll call them back later. For now I have to figure out what to do with myself now that I'm here. I took the paper out of my pocket. The landlords number from Rose. I dialed it before I could think about it to much realizing as I did that I didn't even know this guy's name!

"Hello." Said the person on the other line.

"Hi, I was just calling about an apartment, I heard about from a girl named Rose on my plane ride here."

"Ah yes of course." The person said shuffling papers. "We have an available room." The man gave the address.

"When would that be available?" I asked, I could probably get a hotel for a few days.

"Your free to move in at any time." The man said kindly.

"Anytime? You mean like today I could come by and thats it."

"Sure I'll just give the other tenants a call."

"Really? You don't have to do any like... Back round checks or anything?"

"Nope."

"Thank you I guess." I said still somewhat in awe at how easy that had been, maybe rentals in America were easier to get than in Japan, it had taken forever to get all the details straightened out when moved to Tokyo and people told him that he'd moved into his apartment quickly.

"Your welcome. I'll drop the key by the house for you."

"Wait can I have the address again." I checked my pockets for a pen but didn't found that I didn't have one. "Excuse me." I said to a brown haired boy standing near me. "Do you have a pen?"

"Yeah sure, here." He handed me a black pen with a metal skull on the top. The man on the phone repeated the number, and I jotted it down on the back of the paper with the number on it. I thanked him and hung up the phone.

"Here, thanks so much." I said handing the pen back.

"No problem." The boy said with a bored shrug taking it back and shoving it into the back pocket of his gray jeans.

"Hey you don't happen to know where this is?" I asked showing him the address I'd just copied down.

"Sure I do." He said lighting a cigarette as we walked outside and pulling his hands into the sleeves of his black and white stripped shirt to shield from the cold. "I live in the exact same building ironically. Need a ride."

"Yeah that would be awesome." I said very confused, what were the chances of that!?

"Thats our ride if your coming." He said. As a once blue Reliant K pulled up in front of us.

"Come on get in." The girl driving called in an airy tone. She had long dark hair and was wearing a shall, and didn't seem to care that she was picking up another passenger she had never met before. I climbed into the backseat with the luggage, while the boy got up front.

"Its so crazy that we're going to the same place." I said realizing again just how weird that really was.

"Yeah." She said. "Put that thing out its letting off a fowl bad aura." She swatted the cigarette out of the boy's hand as we reached the tolls to exit the airport. She handed the man behind the glass a few bills and he let the car pull through. The shifted back towards her and began talking again as we got on the road that was clearly leading us towards Portland.

"I was just dropping my friend off. Hes going to England." The boy informed me moving the rear view mirror so that he could see if I responded.

"Where are you from? I get the feeling your foreigner." The driver asked turning the mirror back for her use.

"Oh yeah I am. I'm from Japan."

"Ohh." They both said in unison looking knowingly at one another.

"What is there something wrong with that." I asked slightly taken aback by there peculiar response.

"No don't be silly love." She said with a half smile.

"Its just a coincidence." The boy continued. "Your roommates also from there."

"Its a big country." I said causing the boy to laugh as he looked over to the woman.

"I think you should tell him." He said to her.

"Okay." She agreed. "This is secret so you can't tell a single soul."

"What?" I asked starting to think that maybe I shouldn't have gotten in the car with these people after all.

"The building is for people who are in the wittiness protection program." No way could she really be serious! I thought.

"Wait a second, but then why would I be aloud to live there?" And without any checks on me at all, it seems a little to easy for something government instigated. If years of working for a government organization had taught me anything it was that nothing was ever done with tons of needless paper work.

"Because you were invited." She said simply.

"Why was I invited?" Just invited to live with people who are being hidden from criminals? Doesn't that seem like a good way to get people killed?

"Sometimes we just need to fill rooms." She responded in a slightly vague way. "So you have to make sure not to tell anyone alright?" I nodded.

"So everyone there is going to be using like fake names, lives, and you know everything like that?" I had worked with a few people who were placed in witness protection and they had to change pretty much their whole existences in order to keep from being recognized.

"Kind of." The driver said. "Since everyone is in it when at home they don't really need to worry all that much about it."

"They?" I asked, there were many of them living in one place? That seemed like a logistical nightmare for whoever was in charge.

"My dad owns the place so I'm not a member, but he is." She motioned to the boy next to her. "He doesn't have to lie when hes with only other people who live at the house."

"Oh sure I do my name is Bob Smith and I'm an accountant from Kansas."

"Aren't you kind of young to be an accountant Bob?" I asked interested, the woman shock her head smacking her passengers playfully.

"Hes lying, don't believe anything he says." She said. "Ah were here." The place was a dilapidated mess. It looked a little like somewhere between a crummy apartment building and a sleazy motel the two story kind with doors all facing inward at a courtyard like place, or at least it once had been. Now it was falling to pieces, some windows were boarded up and the paint was peeling from the plastic siding which looked like someone had tried to fix many years ago. The grass around it was yellowing and dry even in the pouring rain which appeared to be constant in this city so far as he could tell.

"It looks better on the inside." Bob said slapping my shoulder as we got out of the car in a reassuring way.

"Really I've never seen anything wrong with it." The woman said softly looking over the outside of the building where they were all now residents. "By the way love, my name is Cassie Hunter if you need anything you just ask me or my dad."

"Yeah I think I talked to him on the phone when I was asking about coming to live here, is that right?" I asked looking over my two neighbors.

"Well..." She said.

"No way." Bob interjected. "The mans a freaking psycho, he wouldn't get near a phone with a forty foot pole." The guy on the phone had seemed pretty lucid, could that be who he was referring too?

"I thought he was in charge of this place?"

"Well he is technically still in charge as he owns the building, but dad just was never the same after the war." Cassie looked over towards the courtyard, situated amongst the tall grass and weeds were a pair massive steel doors. Interesting in the totally normal environment of a apartment building, but at this point nothing could really shock me.

"What she means by 'just never the same' is he snapped and lives in a fallout shelter because hes sure the world is crashing down or something of that nature." Bob lite a cigarette, placing it between his lips so that his hands were free again. "Well then, see you tonight man."

"Whats tonight?" I asked the younger man who was now heading over in the direction of a lower floor apartment. He stopped leaning against the staircase, shoulders hunched forward.

"Poker night. Unfortunately thats the top entertainment of the week around here, sad isn't it? So I'll see ya there... um... hey what is your name anyhow?" He asked green eyes looking me over briefly.

"Oh yeah I'm Matsuda, um I mean Touta." I said remembering that it was more common for people in America to go by first name, especially since Bob (or whatever his name really was) couldn't be much older than 18 or 19.

"Cool, nice meeting you than Touta Matsuda." The boy continued into the apartment on the right side of the building.

"Cassie!" I looked over to see the man who'd called her running over. "Gary wouldn't give me the spare key for the new guy."

"What do you mean hon?" She asked locking the car and leaning against the it with her sheer scarf shall tightened around her.

"I mean your dad said no and locked himself in." The man threw a hand through longish sandy colored hair, which was sticking to his slightly sun tanned face from the now only trickling rain drops. He was that tall, sorta surfer type often associated with American stereotypes though with a few more years on him then most people of who looked this way "I'm not dealing with him." The man snapped stalking off back towards another lower floor door.

"Sorry about that, Brandon's usually a kinder person, but dad has a way of doing that to him." I nodded, there did seem to be a lot interesting people living in this place, at least everyone else appears to have some trouble as well. She leaned down and knocked on the metal doors which resonated in the slightly abandoned area. "Dad!" She called loudly, though I doubted that anything could be heard through a fortress like those doors seemed to be.

"What do you want?" A loud gravely voice responded through a slot opened near the base of the metal door.

"Father, I think that you should unlock this door now." Cassie said in a serious reproachful way.

"I can't hear you girl!" The man called loudly pressing his ear to the opening, but instead opting to push the door opened.

"Where is the spare key?" She asked, not taking very much notice of the man, instead merely looking him over with a brief glance.

"I'll never tell!" He shouted raising a spindly arm over his head which caused the overly large sleeves of his filthy white tee shirt to fall in a mass at his shoulder. His uneven eyes twitched over me and than back to his daughter who he glowered at shaking his head in a oddly bird like way.

"Father?" Cassie tried again, by the tone of her voice this wasn't a highly irregular occurrence, much as I hated to judge people without really knowing them maybe Bob was just a little right about her dad being sort of out of his mind...

"Nope!" His head spun to the side leading his entire body along with it as he turned back towards his stairway which clearly went to some kind of underground house he kept himself barricaded within.

"You can head upstairs the house should be unlocked." She pointed to the upper floor at the farthest door to the left. "Mr. Yagami's not home right now, but he always leaves it opened."

"Wait did you say Yagami?" My chest tightened slightly, it was rare now a days that anyone mentioned the Yagami family especially around the NPA members who had been in the Kira task force. Coincidence had way of being irksome, even more so when it popped up in a completely random situation like the one I had created for myself.

"Yeah." She said waving off the clearly confused look I was giving her. "I really have to go deal with my dad if your alright to get there on your own?" I forced myself out of my mind quickly enough to quickly nod at her, and began to head towards the next floor. Behind me I could hear them still talking.

"What do you mean deal with me girl?!" He yelled demandingly, as she went down to the shelter followed by her father still bellowing in her direction. Now that I was really here the whole thing was beginning fully catching up with me. I was in a foreign country, in a city I'd never heard of, with no idea how I was going to survive. Yet somehow hearing my roommates name, even if it was just a random tangent to my life, still made me feel a small amount of comfort in my current situation. I reached the door sucking in a deep breath through my nose, just open the door, I told myself, whats the worst that could happen at this point? I turned the knob, which gave under my grip, good thing it was she was right that the door was really unlocked. Inside was actually quite home when I'd seen the outside I had thought it would be a mess, but it appeared to be a totally normal apartment with cleanly painted walls and hard wood floors. My eyes feel to the center of the room, a little girl was laying up side down on the black leather couch, head hanging down near the floor and her feet propped on top. She flipped up short brown curls flopping just above her shoulders, as she turned off the television without a word.

"Hi." I said waving tentatively at her, she waved back enthusiastically. "I'm sorry I think I'm in the wrong apartment my roommate..."

"Oh!" she said cheerfully smiling at me and turning the TV back on, how strange what made her do that? "You must be Mr. Yagami's new roommate." I nodded each time I heard that name...

"I'm Pearl I live downstairs from you guys, but I'm not allowed to have a television so he lets me watch in his apartment well hes out." She explained to me scouting over on the couch and patting it to show me I should sit down.

"I'm Touta." I said holding out a hand, she shook back with her whole body hair flying in whists across her freckled face.

"Do you want to watch?" I nodded though it seemed like such a normal activity to be doing after everything that had happened, maybe that would be a good shift. I sat down in the place she had indicated and turned to the TV set against the wall in front of us. The news appeared to be on which was interesting considering the fact that this little girl, who couldn't be older than 6 would be watching by herself. "Have you heard about this?" She motioned to the screen where a a woman reporter was talking.

" Hello this Sandra Peterson. Breaking news the Art Thieves are at it again." She was saying. "The Portland Art Museum is sad to say that yet another of the master pieces has gone missing, after the events of last week the traveling exhibit was pulled but now the museums prized Monte has gone missing as of yesterday February 4th. A spokes person has said 'we are deeply saddened that someone would do this art should be seen by all, we hope that it will be safely returned.'"

"They keep upping security its crazy." Pearl said. "I don't usually watch the new but one time when I came over to watch TV I had to wait for the news to end so since then I've kinda been following this whole story. Its weird right?" I nodded. "You don't talk much do you?" Pearl said scrunching up her nose and cocking her head as she looked me over as though inspecting.

"Oh. Sorry. I just have some thing on my mind." I said, something was really an understatement, but there was no need to spill my own issues on a little girl I just met.

"Want to see your room?" She bobbed up and down clearly enjoying the fact that the couch bounced her back up when she did this.

"Sure." She lead me through the main room, which seemed to house the living room and kitchen. Set back behind the counters was an alcove with bookshelves and chairs, it all seemed so pristine and well put together to be inside of the building I had entered, but maybe the person who I was living with had put a lot of work into since there didn't even appear to be any cracks in the walls or nothing seemed in disrepair. There were three doors, one on the wall in front of us adjacent a large and shockingly non-broken window, and the other two facing one another in a nook on the third wall. Pearl opened one of the two facing doors and lead me inside.

"It has some stuff in i, but its all boring my rooms pink." I laughed. "Do you have any stuff?" I shock my head. "Thats alright a lot of us don't when we move here, its a chance to start over thats what June always says."

"Wait your in the witness protection program as well?"

"Yeah." She said smiling. "Kids need protecting. Do you need a change of clothing cause you smell." I nodded only kids were ever that honest with you, at least she was being helpful.

"I was on a plane for a long time getting here." I told her looking around my new bedroom, it as plainly furnished with only a bed, nightstand and desk against white walls. On the bright side though it was a place I could call mine in this city I was now living in.

"Really? Thats cool. I'll go ask around for something for you to wear if you want." I nodded. "See ya than!" She said calling back to me as she headed back out the door.

"Wait..." She popped her head back in, chin resting against the frame. "This Mr. Yagami you don't know his first name do you?"

"I can't remember it really, or even say when he tells me." She said. "Suey something like that. I don't know." My breath caught, thats weird... The sound she made was just to close to... "Why?" She asked wide, round almost black eyes looked me over curiously.

"No reason. I just knew someone with the same last name."

"Oh I see. I'm gonna go check about the cloths." She said waving at me one last time, and than she walked away. Than I was alone. Leaving me in the house that at anytime this Mr. Yagami could show up in. I paced for a while thinking about everything that had happened and that was now continuing to fall into place.


	3. Chapter 3

I had finally managed to sit down back on the couch when the front door opened. I looked nervously, though for the life of me I couldn't even figure out why I was so caught up in a name, letting my eyes fall on the now partially opened doorway waiting to see the person who would walk through at minute... The person who walked through stopped just as he had walked inside. I froze completely, my sight was telling me one thing while my brain was attempting to find logic in who I was seeing in front of me. Chief Yagami. All of a sudden I lost my ability to think and all I could muster was demanding an explanation for this person who it was impossible for me to be seeing.

"Who the hell are you?!" I yelled grinding my fingernails into the couch. "And why the hell do look... look like that!" Rational? not really. But my thoughts couldn't come up with anything better, anything that made the whole situation make any sense...

"Calm down." The man said moving towards me, I threw myself back, knowing how crazy I must look as I swung my legs over the back of the couch falling backwards into the alcove.

"Who are you?!" I screamed slamming my arm across my face to whip away the damn tears that were starting to pour down my checks, what was going on? If everything so far hadn't been odd enough all of a sudden I was facing a person who seemed in every way to be someone I knew to be dead! I feel shaking against the wall as the other man rounded the corner to where I was. He reached out holding his hands in a surrendering way.

"Matsuda..."

"Why do you know my name?!" I demanded moving farther away as he tried yet again to approach.

"Please..."

"Shut up! Shut up! Please shut up!!!!" By this pointed I had backed all the way to my door, I reached behind me pushing it opened and slamming it behind, shutting myself in, away from...Him. I fell down in front of the door so that it couldn't be opened. Even when he spoke it sounded like him, but there just wasn't a way...I had been there in the room, I had watched him die, there was no way that the man in the other room was Soichiro Yagami, no matter how much I wanted him to be...That was the part that hurt the very most, from the first second I had heard the name Yagami somewhere in my thoughts I had convinced myself I was hearing things, thinking everyone was saying that because it was who I wanted here as I completely feel apart...Than that man walked through the door...I must be losing it, thats the official answer to all of the events of the last day, all the pain, sadness and trauma had finally caught up with me over the last year and now I've cracked under the pressure. I buried my face in my hands trying to contain the sobs the were now wracking my body with little success. A tap on the door brought me slightly back to the reality of what was happening.

"Matsuda would you open the door." I shock my head quickly, though I knew he couldn't see the action. "I'll take that as a no. I know that this must seem really weird to you. Its weird for me to when they told me that I was told I had a new roommate, but they didn't mention who it was. If I had known I would not have just walked in like that. I'm sorry."

"I saw you die." I managed to mutter not even sure if it was loud enough to hear.

"I know but I'm not dead." Clearly, I thought or maybe not it didn't really seem like anything was at the moment the fog that I had been functioning in for the last day or so was still messing with me, that was the only explanation.

"I saw it." I retorted.

"I know what you thought you saw, but just like everyone else in the house I'm in the witness protection program." He told me through the door. Witness protection? Really? How could that work..?

"Why you?" I opened the door a crack peering through to the man on the other side, he knelt down slightly to be closer to my level.

"I needed to, what other reason do people normally do that sort of thing Matsuda?"

"So you lied?" He nodded regretfully looking away from me. "But why?" I couldn't think of anything else to ask, it just kept coming out over and over again. Why would he do that!? It just wasn't...What could possibly have been so bad that he would have faked his own death, abandoning his family and the case, just to get away?

"It was for all of our good, it was the only way to be sure that everything would continue to run smoothly ." He explained, could he really be making that up? Would he? "I'm so sorry, I really am. I never wanted to lie to everyone I knew. I'm just sorry." By the down cast look on his face and the way he spoke I really did believe that he was telling the truth, he wouldn't have hurt everyone like that without a very good reason. I knew him and I knew that he just not that selfish. I reached my hand out the door poking his leg tentatively. Childish as it seem, he felt like a person.

"You seem real."

"I'm real." He smiled reassuringly. I knew it wasn't the most rational thing in the world but I did the first thing that came to mind. I though my arms around his neck. I could feel I had taken him off guard, yet he still pulled me closer in a paternal matter. I bit back the tears that were still streaming down my face. "Its alright." He told me quietly leading me to the sitting area in front of our rooms. I sucked in a breath regaining a little more composure. He sat me down on the couch moving over to the kitchen area to make tea. Even though everything in my mind was telling me to not trust what I was seeing, something else was making me think that maybe I was wrong. Maybe that was what drew me here…Just maybe I was meant to get on that plane, as I had felt in the beginning, and this was why. To find out the truth.

"So…" I said. "Did you hear what happened? I mean with the case and all." He nodded not looking up from the counter top that he was leaning against.

"Yes I have heard about it." He muttered.

"I'm sorry." Some how at this moment I was so glad that he hadn't been there, so glad he hadn't seen Light the way we had.

"For what?" He looked up in interest.

"Your loss." I cocked my head to the side, how could he not automatically think of his son's death when referring to the Kira case?

"Its not your fault."

"Well it kind of is I mean..."

"No its not." The kettle went off. He moved off the counter to go grab it.

"Can I tell anyone that your alive." He shock his head not looking back. "But with case over what difference does it make?"

"Its complicated." He said. He walked back over and handed me a mug. "You need to keep this a secret Matsuda can you promise me that?" I nodded. "Now can I ask you a question?"

"Sure."

"Why are you here?" Oh where to start, even I really didn't know what I was doing here, but I knew how stupid I would sound if I said that.

"Well that's kinda an interesting story." I said thinking over the last few hours events. "I think I kind of snapped to be honest. I just couldn't continue with everything that happened with Kira and you and Light I just…Couldn't stay there… So I came here. I kinda thought I'd gone insane 'cause you were here, but you are so…I haven't which is good."

"When you say 'you came here' what do you mean by that?" He asked leaning back in one of the arm chairs to watch me.

"Well I was going to work and I guess I just couldn't do it anymore…So I left and came here."

"Did you tell anyone?"

"I left a note and said goodbye." He gave me a questioning look. "Well I guess you could say that I didn't tell anyone. Its not like they wouldn't be able to figure out I was gone if I stopped showing up."

"How would you feel if one of the others took off with out telling you." I shrugged though I knew that wasn't really how I felt.

"I think I might be worried."

"Don't you think that they might feel the same way?"

"I guess so, but no one cares about me. Its fine."

"If you really believe that's true, but I think that you should at least call to let them know that your alright." I nodded.

"Yeah I guess your right." I took out my phone trying to decide who would be best to call.

"I believe Aizawa is in charge of the force." The chief suggested.

"Yeah…How'd you know?" He shrugged signifying that he wasn't going to tell me, maybe he was just keeping up on what we were doing. Somehow reassuring. I dialed the number really dreading the conversation I was about to have.

"What the hell is wrong with you?!"

"Hi Aizawa." I said softly, I suppose I deserved that kind of reaction.

"What the hell is going on? Yesterday you call me with some bizarre thing about needing to get on a flight then I get a note that is barely even readable saying that your quitting! Where are you?! Are you in Tokyo?!" He shouted I could see him slamming a fist on the desk to emphasize his point in a physical way.

"No." I knew this would go over well, but braced myself for the response.

"Then what about the plane?!" I could tell he wasn't understanding what was really going on, at this point he still just thought I was stupid, not completely out of my mind and stupid.

"Well I kinda needed to leave actually."

"What do you mean kinda needed to leave? Where are you?" He'd stopped yelling now, maybe he was beginning to see that I was just trying torture him by not showing up to work.

"Well…Actually I'm in the US, but I was just calling you to tell you that…Cause I thought you should know or something…" I said looking pointedly at my new roommate, who rolled his eyes turning back to cleaning the dishes.

"Are you coming back anytime soon?" Great now he was frustrated with me, not that this was really new.

"No." I said. "Didn't you say you got the note. I quit." Could I have made myself more clear? I couldn't be there, he would just have to understand that.

"You idiot…When are you really getting back?"

"I just told you. I'm moving here and I'm sorry but I'm not coming back. Ever."

"Shut up! Yes this is all very funny now get to work!" I had spent so very many different times at the tail end of these sorts of comments that I was more than able to stand my ground. At least I was getting better at doing so, and this wasn't something I was willing to argue, for my own sanity I needed to be away whether he understood that or not.

"I told you I'm not coming back." I heard other people talking behind him on the other line, I knew perfectly well who would be there, but why was he talking to them..?

"What are you doing in Oregon?!" Unless…

"Did you trace my call?!" I snapped, what the hell! What right did he have to do that!?

"Yes. Because when people go missing that is what you do Matsuda!"

"I'm not missing!" I growled angrily. "I also have no reason to talk to you, I'm going bye!."

"Don't you dare hang up that phone before explaining your…" I hung up the phone not wanting to justify why I'd left and quickly turned the sound off the phone encase he called back.

"Do you think that was the best way you could have dealt with that?" He asked, I nodded not looking up off the floor. "Really?" I sucked in a breath and shock my head.

"I had no choice. He was yelling at me." It sounded so pathetically young as the words left my mouth.

"And why was he yelling?" Chief Yagami asked sitting down next to me on the couch.

"Because he hates me." Cause that would help me sound more adult…

"Really?"

"Yeah, he always yells at me."

"Did you ever consider that maybe he's yelling at you because he's worried." He asked in that terribly paternal way older adults suggest something they believe to be totally obvious that you are clearly ignoring.

"Your wrong." I said.

"Hello!" I heard Pearl call as she reentered the house. "Where are you?"

"In the sitting area." The chief called.

"Hi." She called enthusiastically as she bobbed into the area we were seated. "Your back Mr. Yagami."

"Yes, hello Pearl." He said. "This is my friend Matsuda."

"What? Thats not what he told me." She looked at me. "Why would you lie about your name?"

"I didn't." I said smiling at her, I wonder how old this kid was, she seemed pretty smart for how young she appeared to be.

"But?"

"Thats my last name." I said.

"You guys are friends?"

"Thats right. He worked with me back in Japan." Chief Yagami said.

"Really?" Pearls eye widened. "I mean this must have been a shock to you, the whole thinking he was dead thing hm?" Shock? That was the understatement of a century! More like completely and utterly unable to believe what I was seeing, that would cover it more appropriately.

"Yeah it was actually." I said simply.

"Ohhhhhh," she said, "thats why you wanted to know his name." I nodded. "For you." She held out a folded pile of clothing. "You can borrow these."

"Thank you." I said gratefully taking the clothing, I really should have brought more with me but I guess it wasn't what I was thinking about when I left.

"The clothing is your neighbors, but Cassie said that she will bring you shopping tomorrow."

"Thats great but I could probably figure that out myself."

"Oh its no problem Cassie works at Saturday Market, thats this place that sells a bunch of stuff. So shes going to be there anyways."

"Well then okay..."

"She also wanted me to ask if you needed work."

"Yeah I guess so, but you guys are really being to nice to me." It was crazy really, I had only met a few people since arriving in America and they all been so insanely welcoming. I guess I must have gotten lucky with where I found to live.

"She needs someone to help her set up."

"She only works weekends though." The chief said. "So you could work there this weekend or however long until you find a real job that is more what you do. I figure you don't want to be working at a street fair."

"No that sounds just fine. I have no intentions of doing anything police related ever again." I said, I knew it sounded really silly but somehow I could never imagine myself back in the force. "And well saying as I don't really have any marketable skills I can set up a booth or whatever."

"Sometimes I go help to." Pearl said.

"Even though your not supposed to." Chief Yagami pointed out.

"Yeah I'm not supposed to go its really busy and Cassie has to work so I could get lost."

"Well then I guess you could come this time if I'm going." She beamed up at me bouncing cheerfully.

"Oh yeah." Pearl said.

"You should go change Matsuda." The chief said, I nodded and went back to my room. When I came back the two had moved back to the television.

"Your coming to poker night right?" Pearl asked turning to look at me as I came towards them.

"I guess so."

"Yay." She said. "Its really fun I can introduce to everyone okay." I nodded. "Fun. We can go together. You to Mr. Yagami?"

"Yeah I was planing on going." Was everyone here always hanging out together, they all at least went somewhere once a week which seemed odd for an apartment building. Maybe they were just really friendly neighbors, or maybe this was common in America...

"Cool." She said. "Come on." She grabbed my hand then the chiefs. "Lets go." she pulled us out the door.


	4. Chapter 4

Pearl lead me to a door on the same floor as mine on the left side of the building and didn't knock before entering. "I brought the new guy." She announced. The room was highly crowded, evidentially this apartment was much smaller than the one I was in though a similar layout, it only appeared to have one room.

"Hey." Rose said running over to me, the girl I had talked to on the plane!

"Why didn't you mention that you lived here when you gave me the number?" She cracked a smiled throwing an arm over my shoulder, I suppose we had just spent 13 hours on a plane together at least that meant I knew a few people here.

"That might have seemed a little forward." She laughed flipping her blond ponytail to the side as she gestured widely with her hands.

"What? Forward?" I asked cocking my head at her in confusion.

"You know for me to ask you to move into my house, that seems a little forward. We just met, come on keep up with me silly!"

"Don't confuse the poor man." A voice said behind me. A man with shoulder length dark hair joining us at the door, he was dressed in a suit which seemed oddly formal for the event. "Look at him isn't it bad enough already Rose?"

"What?" I said.

"Hes making fun of you." Rose said slapping my arm lightly. "But don't worry thats 'cause he sucks, by the way this is Reiji he lives next door to you guys." I nodded everyone here really hung out weekly? Funny!

"Hey I wanted to introduce everyone!" Pearl snapped stomping her tiny foot at the older girl.

"Sorry kiddo." Rose said ruffling the little girl's brown curls affectionately.

"So wait." I said. "If you live here why didn't you back with Cassie?"

"She gave you a ride? Thats great good thing she was there, oh yeah they were going today... I had to run to the store to get snacks and such for this." She motioned to the room. "This is my place."

"Did you pay for the snacks?" Chief Yagami asked, pay? I looked back at Rose, granted she was a tad offbeat, but stealing really?

"What kind of a question is that?" She asked indignantly.

"Did you?" He asked again in the severely paternal way that he sometimes spoke to me.

"No. But I'm still offended that you asked."

"You stole?" I asked why didn't anyone seem surprised by the fact that she would do something like that!?

"Well yeah." She shrugged rolling her eyes unenthusiastically.

"She does that all the time." Reiji snarled flicking his hair from his shoulder pretentiously. "It drives Cassie insane. She always ends up going to the stores and leaving money for the stuff that Rose takes. I don't really understand why, its not like it makes a difference if it is already taken, but she says its something about honesty. Whatever thats supposed to mean in the modern market..."

"Is anyone going to want drinks?" A girl yelled from the kitchen interrupting his ranting. Pearl pulled me over to her.

"This is Lisa." Pearl said gesturing to the young woman who was bouncing around the counter tops preparing a few glasses. She had long red hair which was swept back in a ponytail to one side wearing what looked like work out clothes with a over sized sweater.

"Hi." I waved at her which caused her to smile and return the gesture.

"Hey ya! Rose told me she met you on the plan." I nodded. "Cool. What do you drink?" She ask showing off the wide array of options which were all strewn across the counter.

"Beers fine by me." I said having always been over stimulated by the fancier drinks, who could ever remember all the names and stuff to know which ones weren't sick!

"Thats no fun." She pouted moving to the fridge. "Justing kidding beer is fun too Rose keeps like a hundred kinds in the house, so anything in particular?" I shock my head. "Here this is good then, at least thats what all the 'Northwest has the best beer' snobs tell me." She handed me a beer with a label which read 'Full Sail Pale Ale.' Worth a shot I guess... "Don't worry its not to fruity."

"Are you giving this man a girl drink?" An older man with brood squared shoulders walked behind the counter to kiss her on the cheek.

"No I'm not actually." She laughed snuggling against him affectionately. "You want something?"

"I'm good." He said. "Do you know where I put the cigars?"

"There on the table." She indicated a spot not far from them.

"Thanks so much honey." He smiled pecking her cheek once more as she rolled her eyes.

"No problem babe." She said as he walked to retrieve the cigars in question.

"Thats her boyfriend Ado. They live in the apartment across from here." Pearl explained, him he did look a little old for her, not that it was right to judge other people or poke into their business but she literally couldn't be older than 17.

"If your playing in the first round get your butts in seats and around this table!" Called Rose to the general room. "Where the hell is that roommate of yours?" She asked Reiji who was now sitting next to her.

"I don't know sulking." He shrugged dramatically leaning back in his seat.

"Why?" Rose asked raising an eyebrow and screwing up her face at him, clearly she thought it was something the other man had done.

"Because he doesn't like the new counter tops." Reiji explained exasperatedly.

"Really is that all!? Go drag his ass over here." She commanded smacking the other who sneered at her.

"He's mad at me."

"Some one go get Shingo!" She yelled yet again to everyone, it seemed she had a lot of authority for someone who seemed like sort of a spaz.

"I'll do it." Offered an old woman who was sitting on a nearby couch twirling handfuls of a her flora house coat between her fingers.

"Thats June." Pearl said continuing her introductions of everyone in the room. Reiji flipped his long hair over his shoulder in an annoyed way.

"Fine than, I'll go get him!" He snapped stalking from the room.

"June sometimes forgets things." Pearl told me simply, shotting a glance at the couch.

"You know I used to be in the pictures." June muttered eyes wandering the room, but obviously directed at all of us.

"Touta come play." Rose said offering me a seat. Ado, Brandon and Bob were all sitting with her already. The chief was at the couch talking to Cassie. I sat down between Rose and Bob.

"I wanna to play too." Pearl said climbing on my lap. "Don't worry I'll help you."

"Me too." Lisa said sitting on Ado who wrapped an arm around her waist while holding out a box to the general table.

"Cigars?" He offered.

"Of course." Rose said taking two and handing one to me.

"No thanks." I said.

"Loser everyone knows that you can't play poker without smoking."

"Really?" I asked, I'd only ever played once or twice before but there hadn't been any smoking at the event...

"Yeah really. Think about the dogs."

"What dogs?" Lisa asked.

"The ones on tacky tapestries duh." She said lighting hers. I was starting to get that feeling that Rose made obscure references often, and thankfully it seemed mostly no one got what she was talking about which made me feel better in a way. She held the cigar out to me again.

"I'm still not going to." I said.

"Suits yourself." Bob took one from the box looking over at me again. "You don't mind though do you? I mean smoking near you..."

"Nah, go ahead." I shrugged.

"Its really gross that you do that in the house." Lisa complained flopping back to lay her head on her boyfriends shoulder.

"Its not like it will do anything." Ado said.

"It will make you smell." She pointed out, that had always been my feeling on the matter as well one of the many reason I would never start smoking.

"Alright lets start with a five card draw" Rose said dealing the card. We played a round before the door open and two men walked in, Reiji and another who was clearly his roommate as they were bickering still about counters as they both pulled chairs up to sit with us.

"Thats Shingo." Pearl said as the sandy haired man sat down.

"Sorry you can't play." Rose said looking at the new man.

"And why not." He asked in a bored tone that could only be rivaled by his roommate.

"You don't remember." She asked.

"No." The man rolled eyes which were obscured by rimless glasses.

"You were cheating last time." Rose said with exasperation running a hand through her blond hair which pulled out her ponytail.

"Was not." He sneered contentiously.  
"Yeah you were." She attempted again looking around the table for back up.

"Its called strategy." Shingo sighed raising a hand in mock innocences.

"He was card counting." Bob said leaning towards me to fill me in on what was going on.

"But we aren't betting money." I pointed out causing the younger man to laugh.

"Yeah I know." he said. "Just let him play." He told Rose.

"Fine." She said. "But if you do it again I'm going to mess you up."

"Uh hum." He scoffed dramatically and we dealt the cards.

After several hands there was a knock on the door.

"Come in!" Several people called at once. Gary entered the living room.

"Dad you made it." Cassie said standing up to greeting him at the door.

"Great." Brandon mumbled scrubbing his hands over his face.

"Move over boy." Gary said sitting down next to Brandon. "This reminds me of back in the wars..." He started.

"Boring." Rose interrupted.

"Whats that girl? you talking bad about us!" He yelled, how was it that no one seemed all the phased by his ranting, though I suppose you get used to it.

"No sir sorry." She smiled at him waving a hand to show him he could continue speaking.

"Now back to my story."

"These can go on a while." Bob said. "I'm getting another drink. anyone else." Almost everyone said yes. "I'll go get that." He moved most of the bar on to the poker table before offering drinks starting with Gary. "Sir would you like one?" He asked politely, for a kid who dressed like he thought he was tough he sure was nice, odd.

"Of course boy, get me a scotch" He nodded. "What was that?"

"Yes sir." Bob said flipping the bottle in a practiced way and filling a beer mug which he handed to the older man.

"Isn't that a bit much?" Lisa asked quietly leaning in so she was closer to us.

"Not if you want that story to end." The red head boy responded. And Bob was right within minutes Gary was sound asleep. "No need to thank me." He said with a smile. "Thats a trick I learned back in the war."

"You were in the war too?" I asked.

"Hell yes! I was with Gary." He laughed putting out his cigar and replacing it with a cigarette from the pack he was carrying.

"Oh I didn't know that Bob."

"Hes lying." Lisa said. "And why do you call him Bob?"

"Because its his name."

"Oh." She shrugged turning back to look at Ado's cards.

"Well that clears that up. Can we continue now?" Rose asked.

The night continued in this fashion, it had been a while since I'd really just had time hang out with people who totally unconcerned with work or anything really for that matter. It was nice to not feel like anyone expected anything of me, besides which it was also giving me a chance to finally wind down after everything that had happened in the last few years, something I had yet to be able to do.

"What time is it?" Shingo asked. Ado looked down at his watch.

"Its almost one damn..."

"We should get going." The brunette man said towards his roommate.

"Yeah we should." Reiji agreed. "Good night all," He wave. "It was a pleasure meeting you."

"You too." I said. The two men headed for the door. I looked down at Pearl, who had long since fallen sleep in my lap.

"I can take her." Cassie offered. "I was going to walk June back so I might as well drop Pearl off as well."

"Do they live together?" I asked realizing that I didn't know which person Pearl went to for the first time.

"Yeah thats right." She said. I stood up trying not to wake the young girl as she traded arms.

"Did I fall asleep?" She asked groggily.

"You did, its okay love." Cassie said sweetly cradling the girl closer to her body. "Come on now June we need to get back to your room." She took the old lady by the hand to lead her away.

"I'm not even tired." Said Lisa who was falling off her chair by this point, it seemed that she had been drinking about half of everything she served. "I could stay up all night." She attempting to pour herself yet another.

"Honey I think you've had enough." Ado said taking it from her which was causing him quite a struggle. Bob laughed covering it with a cough when the older man glared in his direction.

"On that note I think I'm out." Said Brandon standing up to leave.

"No way." Said Rose.

"Why not?"

"Not without him." She motioned to Gary who was still asleep where he had dropped hours ago.

"Why me?" The blond man asked indignantly.

"Sorry you live the closest by."

"Because this building is so big?"

"Yep." She smiled slapping his shoulder with affection.

"Fine." He shock the older man awake and started dragging him away before he could restart his story.

"We're leaving too."Said Ado who was practically dragging Lisa along with him.

"I'll miss you guys." She said near tears by this point. "I love you all!"

"We Love you too!" Bob yelled. "Every time." He smiled as they closed the front door.

"Maybe one of you should cut her off." the chief who was sitting near us having joined the game as the evening went on.

"Hey thats not my business." The red head defended.

"You encourage it."

"Thats true." Rose said. "He's the bad friend. You know the 'I bet you can't drink that kind of thing' and well Lisa always can, her fault to you know?"

"I wasn't even that bad today." Bob said leaning back in his chair.

"True." Rose said.

"Do you need help cleaning up?" I asked.

"Clearly your the good apartment, who love me best of all."

"Hm?"

"Mr. Yagami is usually my cleaning buddy." She said throwing an arm around his shoulder.

"What am I chopped liver?" Bob asked.

"You never finish cleaning."

"Thats 'cause it boring, but I keep you company don't I?"

"If you call playing video games keeping me company."

"I'm there aren't I?" He asked pulling out another cigarette, it seemed he always had one hanging out of his mouth.

"Not really." She said.

"Well fine then maybe I wouldn't stay."

"Yeah right." She laughed. The four of us cleaned the place quickly, but Bob did get bored and ended up playing video games on the couch leaving the three of us to finish.

"Thanks guys." She said as we left.

"See ya." Bob said heading down the stairs where his apartment was clearly located.

"Bye." I called back. We went back to the apartment. "Good night." I said heading to my room.

"Good night. See you in the morning." In my room I lay in my bed, somewhere in subconscious I knew there should be alarms going off in my brain telling me how wrong all of this was and strangely well the whole day had worked out. Yet they weren't, my thoughts were just blank. In fact blissfully so, for the first time in over five years I fell asleep free of anxiety and ready to face whatever came next.


	5. Chapter 5

"Wake up honey!" I heard a woman yelling. My eyes scanned the room taking in my surroundings, plain navy blue bedding and white walls. It took me a few moments but I remembered where I was than turned my attention to the person at my door. "Sweety." There was a pounding again. I got up and opened it Rose was standing in front of me. "Sugar I have been slaving over a hot stove for hours and this is how you repay me by over sleeping."

"Rose don't you think your being a little forward." I heard Bob yell from the other room where they apparently were both hanging out even though this was supposed to be my house...

"I'm just kidding. Sorry Touta." She patted my head. "I did make breakfast."

"Thats a lie!" It was Bob again. I walked out in to the main room. Bob and Pearl were both seated about the room, she was eating in front of the TV perched on the couch and he was on a stool at the kitchen counter. " made it before he had to head out to the middle of nowhere for work." I sat down next to Pearl sinking into the black leather.

"What are we watching?"

"Your just in time." She pointed at the screen. The newscaster had a symbol in the corner that said Art Theft.

"Yet another of the pieces of priceless art have been snatched by the Portland Art Thieves and authorities still have no leads. The museum has been forced to close its doors and go into lock down until this culprit is brought to justice. I have just received word that the police are calling for some kind of outside help on this case but have been unwilling to say what they mean by that. We go now to Paul on the streets to see how this catastrophe is effecting real people..."

"Here." Rose handed me a plate of eggs and bacon set up like a smiley face.

"Thanks." I said giving it a humoring look.

"So what did you think of your first night here?" She asked sitting down. "I'm sure it was not at all over stimulating."

"It wasn't that bad." At least all the people were welcoming.

"Its okay man." Bob sat between me and Pearl. "We were all new here once and know how bad it is." I smiled. We were interrupted by a beeping sound. Bob pulled out his phone. "I got a text." His eyes scanned. "Its from my roommate hes in england helping out an associate." He explained to me. "He says he got there okay but his trip will be much shorter then originally thought."

"Why?" Rose asked. "Can't you make him stay."

"Nope apparently his friend is taking the lead on that Art thing." He pointed to the TV.

"Really?" Pearl asked wide eyed. "Can I help?" She jumped up excitedly.

"Hell yes. Where are you all planing to be around midnight tonight." I shrugged this could be interesting...

"Clubbing." Rose said.

"Shut up, no, we are all going to be on stack out at the museum." Pearl clapped her hands. "And want to hear the cheery send off he wrote, 'you be on stack out tonight and you better get something useful or you will be left wishing for the quick death of a firing squad when I'm done with you.' I thought that it was a little harsh" He typed something back on his phones keyboard. "I told him we'd be there and signed it with hugs and kisses."

"There in love." Rose said matter a factly. Bob screwed his face up in disgust.

"Gross dude." Bob said. "Its called having friends Rose you should try it some time."

"Hey." She said. "Touta your my friend right?" She made a puppy dog face.

"Sure." I said even it was a little bizarre that I had woken to find half my apartment building in my living room, maybe they were just like that in America...

"Me too. I'm your friend!" Pearl added.

"Well then your all stupid. Speaking of which Touta we have to get to work."

"Right." I stood up and put my plate near the sink. Before heading out the door with Bob.

"You work with Cassie?" I asked, it seemed that no one in this place did anything alone.

"I just help set up, nothing big."

"Oh, your not really going to the museum are you?" I was seriously hoping that this group of kids were not going to trying and play police and probably just get in the way, I knew for sure that all the people I worked with in Japan would have been pissed at having them in the way.

"Sure we are. Thats another of my jobs."

"How many do you have?"

"Only one more."

"Whats that?"

"I work from home answering tech questions on the Internet."

"Sounds exciting."  
"I work from home, its all via a chat thing so I don't have to actually talk to anyone so I can play video games all day I think its pretty exciting." Well at least he knew what he liked in life, though it sounded like torture to me. We hadn't even made it down the stairs when June wandered over to use.

"Hello darling." She said hugging me.

"Wow there." Lisa ran after her, today she was wearing a neon leotard with a wide gold belt almost as interesting as the night before. "Sorry."

"Its okay." I said. As the younger woman pulled the elder one from me.

"You have to see the picture, the good pictures." June said turning away at Lisa's request.

"Really I'm the worst at keeping track of her and its not even my day." The young girl explained desperately clinging to June as she tried to wander away yet again.

"Let me guess." Bob said. "Which of our favorite prudes refused to take their day to watch her."

"Reiji apparently there is some kind of important business thing that can't be missed going on at the convention center. They both said that they will take my day, but hey I'm willing to cut my loses." She smiled. "On the bright side Shingo said that the new counter tops are growing on him, which I guess is a good thing 'cause it means that there not fighting anymore, but they also said that there going to get the bathroom redone which could only mean more of the same as the headed to the bus stop they were already starting."

"Is he coming to the pictures." Junes was now dancing down the hallway.

"Right, we actually did have a reason that we came over here... at least I think its why we did. Any ways we wanted to know if you are coming with us to the movies tomorrow?" Lisa asked tipping her head in a way that made her look like a poodle with her long wavy side pony tail.

"I don't know."

"Its this thing we do every now and then were we all go down to the Hollywood theater and watch Junes old movies." Bob said.

"They play at the theaters?"

"A friend of lives there." Lisa said. I nodded. "Well she is wandering off so I should follow. See ya later." She waved before skipping off. We walked down the stairs towards the road where Cassie was standing by her car.  
"What took you so long loves?" She asked spinning a finger through her hair.  
"I guess we must just be easily distracted." Bob shrugged pulling down a pair of sunglasses against the barely sunny day.  
"Alright we have to get going." I climbed in the back seat with an assortment of pieces which looked a little like a tent. Cassie was driving.  
"So man well I'm thinking of this." Bob turned around to face me. "Monday your coming with me to Multnomah Falls ok?"  
"Sure." It was better to go along, really what else would I be getting done now that I had thrown out sanity to come all the way here I may as well enjoy myself, or at least try too...  
"Rose and Pearl are coming to. See Pearl is having a sleep over and one of her friends lives way out there and Rose has this weird thing that she thinks that people actually want to see the falls so we can kill two birds with one stone. See the falls and get the kid, good with that?" He asked in the direct way he appeared to always speak.  
"Sure why not."  
"Its a plan." Bob fell back into his seat. "We have quite the week planned." The rest of the drive was uneventful as we headed down the highway and across the river. We parked in a lot a few blocks away and carried the items down the street.  
We arrived to a crowded street where many other people were setting similar tents and laying out wears which would be sold at what I realized was a little shopping bizarre. It was also at this moment I realized something else...  
"So what is it that you actually sell?" I asked. Bob laughed.  
"I think that is my cue to get going." he started backing away from us though I wasn't sure as to where he was going since we obviously had the car. "Have fun. I have a max to catch." Whatever that meant. I made a face which must have told him my thoughts. "A train I have to catch a train." He explained with a smile.  
"Bye." I called.  
"Bye." Bob ran off to catch his train.  
"So what do you do?" I asked Cassie again as she stood nearby setting things up on a table.  
"I'm a medium." She said putting out a sign that said just that.  
"A what?" I knew that the word meant in English but it didn't make sense as a profession...  
"A medium. I talk to the dead for people." I nodded. Wow so shes completely out of her mind, no one could do that, I mean honestly people paid money for that? Well I liked her well enough but it seemed strange. "here is a seat for you love." She points out a place to sit. "I'll be right over here. Your job is relatively simple people come to you and give you there name and the name of the person they wish to communicate with along with any questions they might want to ask. That's all you have to do."  
"So you don't talk to the dead right away." I asked, she shock her head.  
"No thats not how my gift work they give me the information and I get back to them the next week." She needs a week hm? So maybe she was skilled in some way, she clearly knew how to find information about people so that she could sound like she knew. I took my seat not really excited to be doing this. At first there was only light foot traffic but as the day wore on it got to be more. I was surprised how many people actually came to our booth, but the biggest shock came when a woman who had been sitting with Cassie walked over to me, there were tears rolling down her face.  
"Is something wrong?" I asked concerned.  
"Oh no far from it." The woman said shaking her head as the tears continued to pour.  
"Your crying."  
"Oh I had an emotional session with Cassie." She said whipping her eyes. "I was just going to give you the name of the person I wanted to talk to next week."  
"Your coming again?" She must be really good at this, I wonder what it was that she did to make people take her word like this.  
"I'm here every week." She said sheepishly. "I talk to all different people mom, dad, grandparents anyone." I gave her a doubtful look. "Your an unbeliever aren't you?"  
"Well, yeah I suppose I am." She nodded with a half smile.  
"How'd you end up working here you a relative or something?"  
"Yeah something like that." I said, it was easier than explaining, because frankly I didn't really know what it was myself.  
"I'll be honest with you when I first started I just wanted to try it but thought it was totally fake, you know it was kind of a joke to me. Then I came back and she told me things that only my mother could possibly know and just everything she said it was her. After that I was hooked and I'm here every week. Shes for real."  
"Wow." I said before taking her information. The rest of the day went on in much the same fashion. The only other thing of note was when someone asked if she was able to talk to pets to which she told them yes but she might not know what they were saying. As it was growing close to closing time which I learned was five Reiji and Shingo both showed up.  
"Hello." I said. "What brings you here?"  
"We didn't want to take the bus home." Shingo explained with a shrug.  
"He didn't I was fine with it." Reiji said Shingo was shaking his head.  
"So was your convention thing near here?" I asked.  
"No we took the max here." Shingo said.  
"Apparently thats cleaner to then the bus so we have to take a detour all the way down town just to avoid the bus." I nodded.  
"What are you doing?" Cassie hissed. "Your not supposed to be here." They shrugged. "Get in here don't stand out there." Weird? She was normally almost nice, but not when they were here for no reason?  
"Alright fine." They moved into the tent where I had been not long ago.  
"What was that about?"  
"Nothing we should start packing up." Me and Cassie packed everything up and carried it back to the car followed by Reiji and Shingo who refused to help. Even as we drove back Cassie still looked upset something about the two men coming to the market had really made her angry, but I couldn't think of what.


	6. Chapter 6

When I got back there was no one in my house so was able to take time to regain myself a little, things were so hard keep up with amongst these people it was nice to just sit in silence, and gather my thoughts a little, something I wasn't do enough of recently. Of course it wasn't long before there was a knock on the door. I didn't have a chance to answer it before Bob walked in wearing a completely different outfit from earlier, now there was white pants and a black and white stripped shirt.

"What is this?" He said looking me over.

"Whats wrong?" I asked trying to see what he could be looking for as he stared at me.

"Why aren't you wearing black?"

"Why would I be?"

"To be on stake out at the museum." He said as if it should have been obvious, but why would we need to wear black to do that? This is why police work shouldn't be left to kids...

"I don't have clothing with me, besides its not like your wearing it."

"My strips are black, but clothing for you. Follow." He signaled out the door and walked into the apartment next door. The set up was very much the one I was in except that the walls were gray, most of the walls were coated in what appeared to be almost an entire church worth of antique relics. The only things which stuck out as new amongst the religious paraphernalia was a large flat screen television and neon green couch surrounded by every game systems I could think of. Wow, that was all that came to mind. "Sorry its a little messy and well I didn't have any say in the decor." He shrugged

"Its okay."

"This is my room." We walked into another similarly toned room, though minus the iconic figures all over the place, so that really wasn't his doing. Bob want to rummage through his drawers.

"So we're really going to go to the museum." I asked leaning against the wall as he looked through his belongings.

"Yep."

"But don't you think we'll get in the way?"

"No I told you its for work."

"I know but didn't you say you were an accountant?"

"Yeah man and my name is Bob." He said with a smile.

"Its not?" Somehow I hadn't really thought to question it as no one had corrected me, but than they were all a little odd, maybe this was something they did to everyone when they were new...

"Here put this shirt on." He handed me a black tee shirt. I could here the front door open.

"Hello?!" Rose called. We walked out to the living room. She appeared to have forgotten the black rule as well, she wore light colored jeans and a pink sweat shirt. "Where have you two been? I looked everywhere."

"Really? I'd think this would be your second guess." Bob said.

"No I started on the bottom and worked my way up. So the only place I didn't check was Lisa and Ado's place."

"I really hope your joking." She shock her head, somehow that figured though.

"You can ask them, and Brandon even yelled at me you should totally kick his ass." She said making a pouty face Bob who smirked and nodded.

"Sure thing I'll get right on that."

"Yeah you better." The door opened again and Pearl walked in also slightly attired in black, her skirt was dark pink plaid and she wore a knit black sweater.

"Pearl!" Bob yelled. "How many places did you check before here?"

"Just Mr. Yagami's house. Why? Where else would I check? Besides maybe Rose's apartment."

"And shes a little kid, whats that say about you?" He shot at the blond woman, who stuck out her tongue.

"That I'm not confined to the strict thinking of a boring mind." She smiled.

"Bull. Anyways." Bob looked over the two girls. "Pearl very nice you got your black on and Rose where is yours?"

"Well..." She said. "I'm wearing black underwear and bra."

"But no one will see that." He pointed out.

"I could flash the robbers." She offered.

"True but that might bring more attention."

"Well I can wear pink because I'm special."

"Theres no arguing that fact I suppose were ready to go. Touta you go change your shirt well I run and get the car keys from Cassie." I nodded. I went into the bathroom before changing into the new shirt. There was no way this was a good plan, though it was probably better I went with them, at least I knew I had a chance of keeping them from getting into huge trouble. I walked back out to see that Lisa had joined the others.

"Hi." She waved.

"Are you coming with us?" I asked.

"Oh no I made you guys some cookies to take with you." She indicated a basket that Rose was holding. Why would we bring cookies with us to a crime scene? As if the whole thing wasn't strange enough to begin with...

"Thank you." I said with a smile to the young woman.

"Your welcome. I hope you guys catch who ever it is behind all this."

"Me too." Pearl said.

"Lets hit the road." Bob called as he re-entered the room.

"I should be getting home then." Lisa said walking out. The rest of us filed down the stairs to the old car. "Touta your driving."

"What I've never driven on this side of the road I can't." I said quickly, besides the fact that I had no idea where I was or how on earth to get where we were going!

"Okay I'll drive but if Cassie asks you totally did." Me and Bob sat in the front with Pearl and Rose in the back. The ride went fairly uneventfully, we took side streets all the way downtown, which seemed to take much longer, maybe it was his way of getting me back for not driving us there. We pulled into a metered spot which he walked away from without paying, I would have pointed it out but honestly with every other lawless activity he seemed to engage in why not this as well.

I started to head towards the front door.  
"Wow man!" Bob called running towards me and grabbing my arm.  
"What?" I asked annoyed.  
"The place is in total lock down theres no way that we can use the front door." He said as though it was obvious that we wouldn't be doing so.  
"I thought you said that you worked for them." Great this was just getting better by the minute.  
"Well I do I just work... Um if we go through the front door then the thieves will see us coming." That was the lamest excuse that I had ever heard, it was better that I came at this point I was worried about what could really be going on.  
"Oh okay." I answered.  
"Check this out." Rose called. We went over to her she was pointing at an air vent.  
"Nice job." Bob said slapping a hand on her back.  
"I found it." Pearl said proudly.  
"Here." Bob put his hands out and Pearl climbed up. She was going to go in first!? Why would you have a child do something like that? He lined her up with the vent. "You think you can get that off."  
"I need some kind of screw driver." She said.  
"I think theres one in the car." Bob offered. "Rose would you." She pulled a small screw driver out of her pocket.  
"Am I the only one that thinks ahead." She passed it up and the little girl got to work.  
"Thats such a lie, why did you have that?"  
"It was still in there from last time I wore the pants." She admitted with a shrug.  
"Why were you carrying a screw driver then?"  
"You never know look how handy it is."  
"I got it." Pearl said handing the grate down. I took it. "Thanks." She said before hoisting herself in. "I can't lift you guys."  
"Its okay just move in." Bob called. She disappeared into the building. Bob put his hands down. "Touta come on."  
"I don't think you can lift me."  
"Sure I can, come on." I climbed up afraid to hurt him. I pulled myself in. Inside was highly claustrophobic, metal walls very close to me and Pearl who had moved in farther to let me come nearer to her. I pulled myself through the dusty corridor. I could hear the other two arguing outside. "Rose I can totally lift you."  
"I know you can but how will you get up."  
"I'll figure it out."  
"Just let me help." I looked out to see Rose lift Bob up, who climbed in moving very close to me so we could look out of the opening. We both watched as Rose moved a few paces back before running and jumping grabbing the ledge me and Bob pulled her in. "I could have done it myself."  
"No you couldn't." Bob said rolling his eyes.  
"When I was a tree sitter I climbed trees way bigger then that."  
"Yeah and look what happened with that."  
"What happened?" I asked curiously but was cut short.  
"Guys. Ssshhhh." Pearl said. "Follow me I found a path." The girl lead the way through the small path. "Theres a vent that lets out on the floor not far from here. "This place is big where are we starting."  
"Second floor, I'll lead the way." The boy said.  
"How do you know?" I asked.

"I found a pattern to the rooms that they robbed." Bob said matter a factly.  
"No way." Pearl said. "The police said that there was no method to what was being taken on the news."  
"And thats why we are helping because well frankly the police aren't that cleaver." We came to a stop at the vent.  
"Just a sec." Pearl said. "I have to un screw this." She was able to put her hands through the holes in the vent as she worked. She pushed it out with a loud clank. She crawled out we all followed. We had dropped to the floor in what appeared to be a main hallway. There wasn't much art in this room, a few statues carefully placed in the middle of the room. I looked in either direction there were two large doorways leading to different wings of the museum. "This is the second floor actually." Pearl said looking around.  
"Gees Pearl that was kind of loud they might know that we're coming." Rose said. Shaking the dust off herself as it covered the meticulously clean wooden floor around her. "We have to be in stealth mode." She dropped to the ground close to the white walls, which were now also covered in her dust.

"It was not that loud." Pearl mumbled rolling her eyes she watched the older girl rolling on the floor.

"Follow me." Bob lead the way and we followed behind with Rose crawling and rolling her way along. We stopped not far from where we had started all crouching down behind half walls which were being used as an entry way to the next section of the Modern art wing. "Everyone stay behind these." Bob instructed. Him and Rose moved to one side well me and Pearl were on the other to avoid the gap between the two walls. The girl had to stand on her tip toes to see over the wall divider. We waited quietly, or as quiet as Rose could manage as she kept being shushed by Bob. I leaned against the wall, this could take forever and it was highly likely they never showed at all, I knew from the many stake outs I had been on that it was always a possibility. Just as I was beginning to think that it was going to be like this all night we heard movement not far from us. The robbers had showed up after all! I looked over the wall as the other three had already done, there were two people now in the room, in plan sight of cameras and security which didn't seem to phase them at all. It was when they got closer that I realized what was really interesting me about these two people.

I knew them.

Wedy was dressed as she always was in a sixties style pink dress with white heels, which seemed a little odd if you were going to be trying to be discreet. Aiber didn't seem anymore prepared in a white tee shirt and dress pants. They were behind all this!? Yet of course, who else would be smart enough to practically walk into a museum and leave with a priceless piece of art work. The two were surveying the room before landing in front a massive painting of a landscape with a small child running across.

"Grab that end." I heard Aiber tell Wedy as they pulled the painting off the wall, how could they not even look for an alarm? Though they were probably disarmed knowing the way they worked, of course that would explain how we got in so easily...

"Oh my god." Rose whispered uncharacteristically serious for her.

"I know them." Pearl said to me quietly leaning in closer so not to draw their attention. "Thats Thierry and Mary."

"What?" I said looking back to the two people who now had the painting on the floor next to them, how on earth did they know Aiber and Wedy. It was almost to random, but really what wasn't these days...

"We know them." I watched as they moved the picture.

"Shouldn't we stop them?" I asked.

"No." Bob said. "We'll stop by their place theres no need to make a scene here. Come on." Bob started back to our entrance.

"What do you mean?" I asked, how could we not be stopping them when they were stealing!?

"I have to talk to someone to figure out what to do." He grabbed my arm and pulled me away from the crime.

Winchester, England

Near

I rolled over looking at my walls of currently not working computer monitors. How utterly bothersome, since we'd returned to England it seemed that nothing that came within fifty feet of me worked anymore. I rolled again pushing at the line of robots who were currently encircling me on the floor, there had to be an explanation for my current difficulties, it was simply alluding me at the moment. Just as I was about to move to my chair to attempt fixing my system once more Rester hurried into the room.  
"Whats wrong Mr. Rester? Are you going to fix the computers?" I asked annoyed with all of them, as they claimed there was no issue...  
"I told you that they seem to be working fine when your not there." Of course that would be the answer, just like last time. He held out a piece of paper. "I think that you should take a look at this." I took it from him and looked it over quickly as it didn't take me long to see what he was worried about.  
"Oh dear that is bad."


	7. Chapter 7

Winchester England

Near

I was starring down at the picture that had been handed to me. The image was less than high quality, it was fuzzy just like all of my computers had been! What was wrong with technology recently. The picture was from a museum in the USA which had been robbed the night before, I looked at the only person in the whole place when the painting disappeared "If I'm not mistaken Mr. Rester that would be one of the police officers that we worked with in japan."  
"Thats right." Rester said. "His name is Touta Matsuda."  
"Is he still with the NPA?"  
"Giavani is looking into that." What could this man be doing at the site of a high end museum robbery? Giavani walked into the room.  
"Near I was looking at the records they have and it was a little vague but I think what it was saying was that he had taken some personal days." Lidner joined us in the room.  
"Theres a problem her." She slammed down a pile of papers. "These. This is a list of all the flight records leaving Japan to Oregon since Mr. Matsuda stopped going to work I, but he wasn't on any of them. I'm going to check flights to nearby states."  
"What if hes using an alias?" I asked, though that would be really suspicious...  
"Oh yeah that could be the case." She shrugged.  
"Yes it could be now would you please run back round checks on every name on that roster." She nodded before moving back to the other room. "I'm going to need to see all of the footage for the museum and the airport also I need to talk to the head of the NPA." Mr. Rester sat down at the computer.  
"The phones still not working." Rester said.  
"One of you is really going to have to do something about that. Right now." The screens over my head stopped being full of static all of a sudden and the video of the museum turned as well, though that still appeared to be fuzzy, so that was the museum equitment not functioning, just like ours how weird... "Thank you."  
"We didn't do anything." Giavani said.  
"That does seem to be the case these days." I said pointedly. "Please go take care of the airport footage."  
"Of course." Giavani said before leaving.  
"Excuse me." Lidner said walking back in. "Um the computers not working."  
"I know."  
"So what should..."  
"Get back to work."  
"The computers."  
"What?"  
"Right yeah I'll get back to work." She stomped out of the room.  
"Near, I have Mr. Aizawa on the phone." He pressed a button. I heard the ringing of the call being transferred.  
"Hello." He said grumpy as always, at least he did his job well and was willing to work with me at most times...  
"Hello Mr. Aizawa I need to ask you a few questions about one of your officers."  
"Yeah, whats this about?"  
"It seems that Mr. Matsuda is a high end art thief."  
"What?!" He screamed, that reaction would have figured, especially knowing his temper with that particular officer.  
"Just as I said." Or at least thats what it would seem, so the NPA doesn't know anything about this? That not a good sign for Mr. Matsuda... "I need to know about the personal trip hes on."  
"Well I actually don't know anything about it." That got him to calm down a bit, so he didn't know, that didn't sound like personal leave to me...  
"Really?"  
"No, hes in Oregon. He was acting strangely." Robbing banks would entail such a thing if you asked me.  
"How did he get there?"  
"A plane."  
"Hes not on the records of any flights that would be in the time frame of when he left."  
"I think I might have helped him to get on a plane with a ticket that wouldn't have been on rosters."  
"That would explain a lot." I said looking at screens, yes he was there, but it was strange, he never got anywhere near the picture that was stolen that night, he just sat across the room muttering and watching, but he was the only one there it had to be him. "You said Oregon did you not?"  
"Yes I did. I have no idea what he could possibly be doing there." He said with a sigh.

"I believe I just told you exactly what he was doing. Stealing priceless art obviously." I told him. "I think that there may be some need for the two of us to work together on this case. There may be a chance that he is not the head of this scheme and there for you may be of some assistance."  
"We would be happy to help clear this up with you."

"Clear this up? Well that is natural. I'm pleased to have your help. We will meet in America. I'll have you ticket information set to you and your men."

"Alright." He sounded reluctant as always, but at least they would be helping after all it was one of his men that was being called into doubt, like a true man of honor he was going to "clear this up" for me.

"Have a lovely day Mr. Aizawa."

"You to L." There was a click be for the line went dead. Giavani came back in.

"The computers aren't working so I couldn't actually watch anything but the printer randomly spit this out." He handed me a piece of paper, a picture of Tokyo International from a security camera which was facing the information desk, standing in front of it was Mr. Matsuda. The time in the corner was circled.

"This at least gives us when he left Japan. Unfortunately this also means that he is working with other people because he was only in America for the most recent theft."The screens were fuzzy again as I looked around, great clearly they were correct in say they hadn't fixed the real issue at hand!

"Well thats good for him I guess." Giavani offered.

"True but this does not get us any closer to cracking the case then we were before. At least until we can talk to him. I still have not ruled out that the NPA is running their own investigation." I turned towards Rester. "Have you found a plane yet?"

"Yep I cleared a flight, we should get going, I also got plane tickets for the NPA that I sent to them." I nodded.

"I'll have Roger pack and meet us there tomorrow."

We headed out to where cars were waiting for us in the garage, which would bring us to the airport. I leaned back in my seat watching the road move by at an annoyingly slow rate. The sooner we get there, the sooner this ends. I hated to be involved in such a frivolous case as art theft. I pressed my eyes closed kneading my knuckles into my lids to relieve the pressure that didn't seem to be going away

"Oh thats pretty! Did you draw that yourself?" I raised an eye brow at the woman sitting next to me. "The picture on the window Near, I like it." She said pointing to the window at my left shoulder. My breath caught, a circle of breath was on the window drawn within it was an ornate Celtic cross with tidy words clear beneath it...Nate Rivers it read. I scanned the car around me quickly, only Lidner was anywhere near me and she couldn't have known that...My eyes fixed on the image for a moment more before I turned my head away, what was wrong with me there was a logical explanation for everything and this was no different, maybe I wasn't getting enough sleep...I smeared the circle with the palm of my hand and curled back into my seat. We reached the airport there were signs pointing in every direction so I stepped in to show which way to drive.

"Go to short term parking I'll have someone pick the car up. I don't want to leave anything laying around." I informed him.

"Alright." Rester turned the car up in to the parking structure. We unloaded the small amount of equipment(and toys) we were traveling with. We didn't have to worry about luggage as always when we arrived for a case it was important to pack lightly. We entered the airport which as usual was packed with tons of people, something that would never cease to drive me crazy when I was trying to get somewhere in a hurry.

"Hey look weird the stuff heres not working either!" Lidner indicated the arrival and departure boards which we were standing close to at the moment, like all the electronics around me recently a sharp static was running across them. How could that be!? The airport workers looked shocked by the sudden mess up which meant until we had arrived it had been totally normal! The three of them seemed unfazed and were heading in the direction of our counter as I stared at the still shaking numbers and words in front of me. There had to be an explanation for all of this, there just had to be logic in here somewhere, just like all things in life there was a solut...I felt someone move close to my side, knowing the other three had walked ahead I stiffened from the hand that had touched my shoulder and spun around, nothing. I looked around me, there wasn't anyone near me, certainly not close enough to have touched my shoulder, in the corner of my eye I caught a mirror, something moved directly next to me, I turned quickly to see the culprit...Still nothing....I sucked in another breath, control your thoughts, your letting your imagination get the best of you! I shock myself, this was silly. I took another breath through my nose and caught up to the others who were finishing talking to someone at a desk not very far from where I was standing.

"You alright?" Rester asked.

"Yes I'm fine." I said, at least I hope I am, there wasn't something wrong... I thought as we headed to the plane.

Portland, Oregon, USA

Matsuda

I woke up I was starting to get used to this place I suppose. It was Monday morning meaning that I didn't have to go to work but that Rose was dragging me and Bob on some kind of outing. As I got dressed in clothing that Cassie had dropped off insisting that I needed a whole new wardrobe and that she had to buy it I realized there was no pounding on the door as there had been every other day. I walked out of my room, the chief was in the kitchen making breakfast, he must have got back when I was sleeping. I would have to talk to him about everything that had happened, especially at the museum, I mean we all knew who the thieves were and no one seemed to be doing anything about it!

"Good morning." He said.

"Morning."

"How was your first weekend?"

"Good I guess."

"Yes I know what you mean."

"No I mean I had fun. Yesterday we all went to this old movie theater and watched silent movies that June was in."

"Oh yeah a friend of mine works there."  
"Yeah I met him." He had been the one that let us in and set it up the projector, apparently he lived at this place called the Hollywood Theater which he had been visiting.  
"They didn't make you do anything to odd did they."  
"No." I said unsure if I should mention the museum, if anyone would know what to do it would be him, but than maybe the others had a reason for not telling... There was a knock on the door before it opened and Pearl entered flopping down on the couch.  
"Are you going to want pancakes?" he asked her.  
"Yes please." She called back.  
"And you?"  
"Sure." I said. Taking a seat at the bar. "How was your weekend? You were at a work thing right."  
"Yes that is right I was down in southern Oregon for work. My boss lives down there so thats where the main office is."  
"Oh, what kind of work are you doing there?"  
"Same kind of thing as before." There was FBI work in there, hm who knew?  
"I've been betrayed." Rose bounded into the room. "Can you believe this." She threw her arms around me. "Hes so mean to us but at least now we can be alone together!" She yelled over dramatically clutching to me.  
"What happened?" I asked.  
"I was betrayed."  
"Pearl your foods ready." Chief said.  
"Coming." Pearl danced over.  
"Your not abandoning me are you two." Rose looked from Pearl to me.  
"Nope." Pearl said. "Are you coming with us Mr. Yagami?"  
"Where are you going?" He asked politely.  
"Some kind of water fall." I said.  
"Multnomah falls? they are lovely. I can come." He told Rose who was still clutching to me.  
"Good I like you better anyways." Rose said.  
"Then who?" Pearl asked. The door flew open and Bob walked in.  
"Traitor!" Rose said crossing the room to him. "Don't you have places to be?!"  
"Yes as a mater of fact I do." He shot back at her.  
"Where are you going?" I asked.  
"I have to get my friend from the airport." I nodded, more than likely the one he had dropped off when I had arrived.  
"Hes choosing friendship over us." Rose said dramatically. "What has this world come to."  
"I just don't know." He shrugged. "Well I actually have to get going. Pearl say hi to your little friends for me." He waved as him and Rose left.  
"Be back in a minute." She called following him through the door.  
"Some of your friends are coming?" I asked the little girl who was sitting at the stool on my side.  
"Yeah." Pearl said. "My two best friends are coming with us." She smiled. "We're gonna go pick them up soon I think. One of them lives not so far and the other on the way." I nodded. "Its going to be so fun."


	8. Chapter 8

Rose came back before we were done eating breakfast still babbling about the terrible wrong that Bob had done to her. As we finished up Lisa came in.

"Hey there." She said. "How was your weekend Mr. Yagami?"

" are they doing out there?" She said interestedly leaning against the counter top.

"Good I think." He said.

"Thats great." She smiled at him.

"You still in?" Rose asked interrupting.

"What?" Lisa looked confused.

"Are you meeting us later?"

"Oh yeah, sorry totally spaced that."

"You spaced our plans." Rose made a sad face.

"No, I mean I did, but not like I really. Damn." Lisa took a breath. "What I mean is that I spaced it a this moment but in general I do remember."

"To late you all suck." Rose pouted.

"I'm sorry."

"No to late."

"Are you coming with us?" Chief Yagami asked.

"No Ado and me are meeting you for dinner." The chief nodded. "We wanted to come but are totally busy."

"Speaking of busy we have to go." Rose said.

"Yeah we told Micheal that we would be there to get him." Pearl said jumping off her seat and pulling on Rose's arm.

"Hold you horses." She said.

"I don't want to hold my horses." The littler girl whined pulling on her arm.

"Then there going to get lose in the house and all that will lead to in a big mess."

"What?" Pearl was losing her temper.

"If you let horses lose." The little girl smiled rolling her eyes and giving in, it was going to take a while to get out.

"On that note I should get going." Lisa said waving to all of us.  
"Come everyone." Rose ran out of the room the three of us ran after her until we reached the car. "I'm driving!" She yelled.

"No your not!" The chief snapped back. "Matsuda you should drive."

"I don't know how to drive on this side of the road." I said plus why on earth would I be the one to drive when they were the ones who knew where we were going?!

"Don't worry I can teach you."

"But I don't have a drivers license here."

"Thats alright." He told me. "There are exceptions for people visiting from other countries."

"That makes sense." I guess, though I had never heard that about America before, normally they were pretty uptight about foreigners and their laws, at least in my previous experience...

"Wait I don't want to sit in the back with the stupid smelly children." Rose said.

"I don't smell." Pearl said.

"So you are stupid?"

"Shut up. I don't want to sit with her she made fun of me." Pearl now joined in the chorus of complaining.

"Put one of your friends in the middle." The chief offered.

"Okay." The two of them sat as far apart on the back seat as possible both at the windows. I climbed in the front feeling nervous. I was in the car barley a minute before turning into the wrong lane. It was a good thing that we live on such a deserted street. Chief Yagami gave me fairly easy instruction and once I got my bearings more in place behind the wheel. We pulled into a parking lot which was in front of a small amusement park, it looked old, though some of the rides were new. It had that air of a carnival that had simply been left there to be rained on all winter. "Kinda creepy, your friend lives here?"

"Yep." Pearl said.

"Really?" Skeptically looking back to the closed down rides in front of us.

"Oh yeah his parents own the place." As I stopped the car Pearl jumped out. Running into the deserted amusement park. She came back with a little boy, he wore high waisted orange corduroy and a stripped polo, short sleeves? It was raining what were his parents thinking? They climbed into the back. The little boy sitting in the middle between the two girls from my apartment building. "This is Micheal." She said buckling her seat belt.

"Hello." I said turning back for more directions. This time we had to get on a freeway which was the most nerve wracking experience of my life, having never driven on anything as fast or as big as this stretch of road, I was more than grateful when we pulled off and were back to side streets again. The building we pulled to was a massive brick manor house, surrounded by acres of land. I pulled the car into the circular driveway where it was able to be left while we apparently all ran inside.

"This is where Addy lives." Pearl said. "Come on lets go look for her." The two small kids got out of the car fast followed by Rose.

"Touta, Mr. Yagami come on." She called. We followed them. Inside the walls were lined with creepy paintings, all in a similar style. Apparently this place was a hotel, the kid were looking for must have parents who worked here or something. I turned back to ask and found to add to my nervousness I was now alone. Damn! How the heck will I find everyone now? I shivered pulling my coat closer to me, weird it was like the room suddenly got cold.... something huge slammed into me knocking me to the ground, I turned to face a bear like dog who like my face gleefully.

"Osa! Osa come here!" I heard a woman call. The dog ran back to a lady wearing a white dress she had tears running down her face. "I'm so sorry." She said smiling at me.

"Are you alright?" I asked looking at her sad face.

"Oh I'm fine, don't worry about it."

"um alright. Is this your dog?"

"Yeah it is. Her name is Osa." I nodded.

"They let you bring dogs to a hotel?"

"No of course not I live here."

"Oh I see." Their friends sure live in strange places...There all tourist attractions, must get loud in the summer time when people are around more...

"How about you are you staying here?"

"Oh no I'm looking for a little girl I guess she lives here as well."

"You mean Addy?"

"That sounds right I think." I said nodding.

"You must be here with Pearl." I nodded. "I'll show you the way." We walked down the hall. Stopping at a door. The woman unlocked the door. At first I didn't see anyone, then I noticed a little girl standing by the window wearing a white nightgown. "Addy." The woman said. The girl turned around.

"Yes."

"There is someone here for you. Are you ready." She nodded. I gave her outfit a second look it was definitely pajamas she didn't even have shoes on, not that this was really that shocking after knowing Near and L who had never really worn shoes either.

"Alright lets go." Addy said.

"I'm not sure where everyone else is?" I said.

"Lets go fine them. Come on Osa." They ran ahead. I took off after them running until we reached the car. Chief Yagami was waiting there. The girl waved. "Hello!" Addy called running over and hugging him. The dog was slamming its head into me.  
"Thats so odd." Addy laughed. "Shes never like that." I laughed too, I had a way with dogs it was like the opposite of a dog whisperer, they all loved me but went crazy when I was around. Pearl and Micheal ran over.

"We were looking everywhere for you!" Pearl said out of breath.

"I was in my room." Addy said.

"Oh we didn't check there."

"Really."

"I guess not."

"I had an epiphany!" Rose had just arrived.

"What?" I said.

"An epiphany." She repeated skipping to the car.

"I don't know what that means." There was only so many English words that it was possible for me to remember at a given moment and I don't even think I had ever learned the particular one.

"Oh, right it means a realization, I think. Wait that is what it means?" She asked looking to the others.

"Thats right." The chief said. "But an epiphany has to be something very big."

"This is big." Rose was leaning on the car as she spoke. "We're not going to all fit in the car."

Thats your epiphany?" I asked.

"Yes it is why do you say it like that?"

"Well it just doesn't seem that big."

"And were only one over." Pearl said.

"Plus the dog." Addy added.

"Is she coming." Micheal rolled his eyes.

"Why would she not come?" The little girl in the white nightgown pouted.

"I will not sit in the back with three kids." Rose whined.

"There fairly small and we are almost there." Chief said. "The four of you should fit fine."

"But where is Osa going to sit?"

"She can sit in the front." Rose offered as she climbed in. The little kids piled in next. I got in the front seat with the chief next to me, Osa jumped in after us. She was trying to sit on the floor but there was not enough space so she climbed up to lay across the two of us. As we continued to drive she gradually put her weight on to me. We followed along a winding road which they all called the scenic highway, it would apparently take long but it was much prettier and easier to drive which I appreciated greatly. We pulled into another parking lot at our newest destination, Rose was the first out of the car.

"That was comfy." She said rolling her shoulders.

"Your being really annoying today." Pearl said as she got out from the other side. "Whats up?"

"Nothing." She snapped. "I'll be back in a little bit." Rose skipped off.

"Don't you think that something is up?" Pearl asked.

"Yeah she kind of does seem like that." I said.

"Can we go play?" Pearl asked.

"Of course." Chief said. "Just don't go to far away." I was surprised that he was letting the kids wander around by themselves. I watched the kids move out of view, Osa stayed behind with me, as she seemed to like to do.

"So what is it that we do here?" I asked feeling a little stupid. The chief smiled.

"Well there are trails and water falls to look at." I nodded.

"Come on Matsuda." I followed him, Osa followed me. We wandered along a heavily wooded path apparently leading to the viewing areas. We stopped as the cliff face with water pouring down it came into view, it was literally huge! "So have you decided how long your going to stay here?" He asked.

"What?"

"Have you decided when your going home?" The chief asked me pointedly.

"I don't know I kind of like it here." I said looking around. "I was thinking of staying."

"Really."

"Yeah."

"Have you told anyone?" I shook my head. "Have you talked to anyone back home besides when I forced you to?" I shook my head again, what did it matter anyhow!

"No." I said feeling bad, every time I looked at my phone I had missed another call from someone.

"Why not?"

"I don't know, I guess... I guess that no one will understand. That they'll just think that I'm crazy." I shrugged. "Does that make sense?"

"Yes it does, but you're not going to know if people will understand if you don't give them the opportunity." Gah why did he always have to be such a parent!

"Oh yeah then what about you?"

"What about me?"

"You live here and no one knows how is that so different?"

"I told you that I'm here as part of the witness protection program."

"Then why are you still being protected we closed the case almost anyone who was involved is dead! What kind of danger could there possibly be! Why should you just go along with your life as if nothing happened! Or not even you live in some bizarre life! What about your family! I didn't leave anything yet I should be lectured!" I turned away unable to look at him. "I'm going back to the car." I ran away feeling like a little kid as I always seemed to feel when I was with him, I was trying not to cry. By the time I got back Rose was sitting there as well and Osa was close behind me. The blond was sitting in the front seat with the door opened flicking through a tabloid magazine. I climbed in the back Osa jumping on me.I patted her head.

"You alright?" She asked not looking up.

"I'm fine." I said knowing that it was a lie. "How about you?"

"I'm fine to." She said clearly lying as well, she had been off all day. Did it have to do with Bob refusing to come this morning? "So what happened to you?"

"Nothing, I just realized that if Chief Yagami has been here then hes been lying to all of us and I guess that just kinda hurt." I said talking through my thoughts. "So how about you?"

"As I said I'm fine." She sat up. "I just... its nothing." The kids came scurrying back.

"Touta!!" Pearl screamed as she stopped. "Can we get ice cream?"

"Yeah we want ice cream!" The other two agreed.

"You don't need that." Rose said.

"Why?" They asked in unison.

"I packed food in that bag." Rose pointed to a bag that was sitting on the floor next to me. Pearl took it looking through.

"Rose are you joking me?"

"Why?" She asked still not looking up.

"This is the strangest food I have ever seen."

"No its fine."

"No Rose its not at all." She pulled out a block of cheese.

"Whats wrong with cheese?" Rose said putting her magazine down to look at the children who were all surrounding us.

"Well theres nothing to put it on."

"Really?" Rose looked over the seat to see what was in the bag. "There is pop corn."

"So..." Pearl egged her on to continue her thought.

"If we cut the cheese very small."

"You didn't pack a knife." I laughed.

"I can bring you to get some ice cream." I said taking the bag from Pearl's hands and placing it back on the floor.

"Cool!" The kids yelled in unison.

"Do you want one?" I offered Rose.

"No I'm good. I like popcorn and small cheese." She shrugged now back to the magazine. Its was strange how when she acted like everyone else I was inclined to feel worried about her.

"I want vanilla!" Addy yelled.

"I want chocolate!" Micheal added.

"And I want swirl." Pearl said. I nodded I had never really had much interaction with children, they had a lot of energy when in groups...

"You guys aren't coming with me?" They shook their heads. "But I don't know where there is any ice cream around here."

"I'll go with you." Rose offered getting out of the car obviously glad to be away from the children.

"Thank you." I said. We walked together to a stand not to far away that was selling ice cream. There wasn't to much of a crowed I guess this place wasn't that popular in February... "Hello." I said to the woman working.

"Hi."

"I'd like a vanilla, chocolate and swirl cone." I said.

"Alright." she said getting the cones ready.

"Your not getting one?" Rose asked.

"No I don't think so."

"What was that?" The woman asked.

"Oh I was talking to someone else." I said.

"Alright." She said getting back to work. "Here they are." She handed them to me.

"Thank you." I said grabbing the cones. "Are you going to help me carry these."

"Nope." Rose said dancing off in the other direction.

"Do you need a hand?" The woman asked.

"No I've got it." I ran back to the car. The kids grabbed there food quickly. Chief had gotten back. "Hi." I said to him. "I'm sorry." He nodded.

"Its alright, we can talk about it later."

"Okay."

"Its getting late." Rose said looking at her watch. "And Lisa has that weird thing about people getting places on time." Pearl nodded.

"Good point." Chief said. "Everyone into the car." We all got in the same seats as before. "We're just going to the restaurant next to the place we got Addy."

"That shouldn't be to hard." I said, I was starting to get the hang of driving.

"Gross!" Rose yelled.

"What?" I said.  
"I'm sticky!" She shrieked.  
"Why are you sticky?"  
"'Cause the kids are stupid and sticky."  
"What?"  
"Ice cream they are getting ice cream all over me!"  
"We are not!" Pearl yelled.  
"Then why is there ice cream all over me?"  
"I don't know!" They continued to yell back and for the whole car ride. Until we pulled in and found a parking space. we piled out of the car.  
"Your late." Someone said from behind us. We turned around, Bob was leaning on a car not far away. "We've been waiting for you for quite some time." He smiled.  
"What happened to being to busy for us." Rose asked walking over to his car and also leaning against it.  
"Well I made some time." He shrugged in a nonchalant way.  
"And what will he think of that?"  
"Well I think that he is going to very upset." Rose smiled. "I'm sorry you know, for ditching you today. I always feel bad when I break a promise to you." She rolled her eyes.

"You had me at hello." She laughed, Bob raised an eyebrow behind his sunglasses.

"I did what?"

"You know that line from that movie? Never mind your just that lame is all." She laughed again. "So tell why are you out here? You should be getting some food."  
"Lisa and Ado are getting it. All of you follow me." He led the way to patio area that was closed for the winter.  
"Are we supposed to be here?" I asked.  
"Addy lives here." Rose pointed out. We all sat down. It wasn't to long before Lisa and Ado joined us carrying a bunch of food, they were joined by the woman in the white dress from earlier. We all ate happily chatting to one another, it was oddly nice to just kick back and relax in a restaurant setting, I rarely seemed to do that anymore but I guess since I had gotten here that had been the constant thought running through my head. I looked around the table at all the people I was with, it was crazy to think that I had only known them a week and already I felt comfortable enough with them to just be myself without thought, I guess I kinda understood why it was that the chief would want to stay here rather than return to the reality of life at home in Japan. When it was time to go Rose opted to go back with Bob who also had Lisa and Ado riding with him. Evidentially the many little children were a bit much for her today. Apparently the two extra kids were going to be spending the night at Pearl's house, sadly Osa was going to be staying home. So the five of us drove back in relative silence.


	9. Chapter 9

Tuesday morning was much the same to any other morning in this place. The chief had been making breakfast, Pearl was sitting in front of the tv, apparently her friends had already gone home. I sat down next to her. The news was showing clips of a teen aged girl.  
"It was like nothing I've ever seen. The writing just appeared on the car." She was saying. "I didn't even believe the stories." It cut back to the news rooms.  
"This is just the most recent story." The reporter said. "We are urging kids to stay away. This is one of many such reports and three teen aged girls have gone missing in the same area."  
"I don't like this story." Pearl said turning to me.  
"To scary?"  
"No just boring." She laughed. "This is happening down where Mr. Yagami works so I've heard a good deal about it. What fun is a crime you know who did." I raised an eyebrow, they didn't seem to know who was doing it.  
"Its already solved. Why didn't they say that?" She shrugged.  
"There trying to deal with it in a low key way. I should probably tell him." She turned around in her seat. "Mr. Yagami! There torturing people again!"  
"What?" He turned to look at the screen."I have to go make a phone call." He put the food on the counter before walking out of the room.  
"Our story is back!" Pearl said pointing to the scream. I turned back.  
"Ever since the switch in the investigation the people have heard very little, but we have reason to believe that there is a suspect and that they will be giving us more information on the matter."  
"A suspect." Pearl muttered this was apparently unexpected by the look on her face.  
"You think they found Aiber and Wedy?" I asked.  
"I think we need to go see Thierry and Mary." There was a knock on the door. I was surprised when the door didn't just fly open, guess its not Rose than...  
"Come in!" I called. Cassie walked in.  
"Hey love." She said. "Where is Mr. Yagami?"  
"Why?" Pearl asked.  
"I was hoping he could help me with finding some people for work. I have a lot of appointments for next week."  
"Whats he gonna help you find?" I asked.  
"Um information on the people. You know." She said smiling.  
"He has a work thing." Pearl said.  
"Did it seem like he was going to be long?" So she had him help her find the people to pretend to be psychic? That made a lot of sense...  
"Yeah he kind of did."  
"Alright I'll go have Brandon help me." She waved. "Thanks guys." Pearl turned to me.  
"We need to get Rose." She said.  
"Why?"  
"Because we need our team if we're going to finish our investigation."  
"Oh." I nodded. She jumped up pulling my hand, were we really gonna continue on this investigation thing?  
"Mr. Yagami we're leaving!" Pearl yelled as we walked out of the room. I shivered against the cold noting that Pearl wasn't wearing a coat, I guess she did live with June so it figured she wasn't exactly well kept... I could give her a coat if need be. We knocked on the door.  
"Come in!" Bob called. We pushed the door open to the brightly colored apartment. Rose and Bob were sitting on the couch eating cold pizza.  
"Hi kids." Rose said. "Pizza?" She offered. We shock our heads. "Your lose. There is no better food then cold pizza."  
"Thats just not true." Bob said.  
"Yes it is." She told him indignantly scrunching up her face to stick out her tongue at the boy next to her on the couch.  
"Why do so many people think that, it is one of those weird things. Pizza was made to be served hot and anyone who says that it should be served another way... well there on crack." Bob said quickly, which was impressive considering that there was his signature cigarette hanging out of his mouth, his eyes feel back to the video game clearly he was done with this conversation. Rose on the other hand scooted closer and smiled at him.  
"I'm on crack." She laughed poking him.  
"Rose have you met you? it just wouldn't be that shocking." Bob shrugged.  
"Hey!" She hit him playfully, to be fair it she was a little odd at times.  
"Um not to break up what ever it is that your doing." Pearl said. "But we have something serious to talk to you about."  
"Are you calling our pizza debate not important?" The blond woman said with mock astonishment.  
"Yes." The younger girl said simply.  
"How dare! We hadn't even started with the ever controversial, does pineapple have any place one a pizza."  
"NO! Thats disgusting." Bob said quickly, so this was a constant discussion?  
"What are you saying! Touta back me up. There is no place that pineapple should not be."  
"Sorry I agree with Bob." I said. "There are a lot of places."  
"Like burgers." Bob added.  
"Why do they do that?" I asked.  
"No idea." Bob said.  
"I'm making burgers with pineapple tonight." Rose said.  
"Everyone!" Pearl yelled interrupting the probably completely meaningless conversation that I knew wouldn't end if she didn't stop it. "I really have something I want to say." We all looked at her.  
"Fine continue." Rose said making a face like she was thinking.  
"I will. I heard on the news that they think that the investigators of the art thefts have a suspect." Everyone nodded. "So I think that we should go see Mary and Thierry."  
"Good idea." Bob said standing up. "I can try to figure out who they suspect later." I nodded.  
"Don't you think we should just tell the investigators what we know?"  
"No." Bob said. "We are going to do that, but we have to get more information first."  
"I really..." This wasn't a place for amateurs, especially if they had people who knew what they were doing on the job.  
"Lets go." Pearl said grabbing my hand again.  
"Looks like we're leaving." Rose said standing up and grabbing Bobs hand. Apparently they knew exactly where Aiber and Wedy lived, and it was in town which was interesting considering but I guess they were stealing from a local museum so it should have figured. The strangest part to me was that the plan just seemed to be to confront them, if they were doing something they wouldn't admit to it would they?

As before Bob convinced me that I had to drive, which was interesting since I had no idea where I was going, but it seemed that I was the only one aloud, according to Cassie, that could drive. It was on the other side of town so I got to get back on the highway much to my distress, but at least it wasn't to long. In about 20 minutes we pulled in front of a small two story brick building in an industrial area. A wooden sign read _White Eagle _so we had made it. It looked like any other bar, but according to them it was also a hotel.

We got out of the car and headed inside. The place was oddly crowded for how early in the day it is. The room was dimly lite and all in dark woods and exposed brick. We were greeted at the door by a woman wearing a red dress.

"Hello there." She said.

"Hi." Rose said waving.

"long time no see kids. Can I get you a table?"

"No we're here on business." Bob said.

"What business?" She raised a manicured eye brow.

"We need to see Thierry and Mary."

"Alright I'll lead the way." The woman lead the way up the small set of stairs, .The walls were lined with odd pictures reminsient of the place we had picked up little Addy the day before, with random quotes all over the place. She knocked on one of the door.  
"Who is it?" Wedy asked from the other side of the door.  
"You have some visitors here to see you."  
"Yes who are they."  
"Its meeeeeeee!" Rose called.  
"Oh dear." I heard the sound of her standing up and unlocking the latch. The door opened to reveal Wedy who looked much the same, her long blond hair was still perfectly groomed and she wore sunglasses. "Come in." She stepped aside revealing a narrow room with pale yellow walls, spirally writing was low on the walls. In the middle of the room there was wooden bunk beds. Aiber was seated on the other side of the room, surrounded by what appeared to be stolen goods. What would make them keep all the things they took back home? Didn't it seem like someone would see it... We all went in except the woman from down stairs who left back to work.  
"I guess that answers our first question." Bob said motioning to the stuff one painting was the one we had seen stolen...  
"Not mine!" Roes said, we all looked at her. "My question is; who gets top bunk?" Aiber laughed under his breath.  
"Are you joking?" Wedy asked.  
"No this is really important."  
"Well if you must know..."  
"I must I assure you." Rose said with a smile.  
"I sleep on the top bunk."  
"You let her get top bunk?" Rose had danced over to Aiber who smiled at her.  
"She thought that I would make it fall." He muttered. Rose cracked up.  
"Really. She did? Your telling the truth?" He nodded. "Mary its a bed it not going to fall." Rose had pulled her self up and was bouncing up and down.  
"Don't do that you terrible child! Your going to break the bed making noise and drawing attention to us."  
"Shes right." Aiber said.  
"Fine." Rose stopped. "Oh yeah Touta this is Thierry and Mary and you guys this is Touta."  
"We've met." Aiber said standing. "Matsuda right?" I nodded. "I thought so. So what brings you all to our neck of the woods?"  
"You really need to ask?" Bob said motioning to the stuff all over the room.  
"Oh that." Aiber said shrugged.  
"What could you possibly want to know about it?" Wedy asked indignantly.  
"We saw you take it." Pearl said proudly.  
"Really?" Aiber said.  
"Yeah we sunk into art museum and saw you do it." She said assuringly to the man whose room we were in.  
"Nice work." He smiled at her, she perked up immediately.  
"And it was even my idea." She gave him a smug smile.  
"Cool." He walked to the corner of the room and picked up one of the smaller pieces. "Here." Pearl took it. "Its for your good spy skills."  
"What is it?" She asked flipping the piece over in her tiny fingers.  
"Its a Forain." The girl smiled. "Make sure to put it somewhere special." She nodded excitedly.  
"Look!" She showed me a picture of a girl dancing.  
"Really Thierry?" Wedy said sneered at her partner making a disgusted face at the small child, she hadn't ever seemed like a kid person to me.  
"What? did you know she was there?"  
"No, whats your point?"  
"Clearly spy or thief material."  
"Right." She turned back to us. "So you saw us stealing and what do you plan to do about it?"  
"Well we're going to make sure that your stopped." Bob said with confidences.  
"Well good luck with that." Wedy said with a shrug, they were really way to sure they wouldn't get caught, I thought they were better than this.  
"We know were you live and store everything." I said. "Its not going to be that hard." The two thieves laughed.  
"Yes cause we would let you in if we thought that there was any way that you might actually stop us. Our plan is perfect." Wedy said.  
"Will just have to see about that." Bob said.  
"I guess you will." The woman said. "Is there anything else that we can help you with?" She asked.  
"Yeah I have a question." Pearl said.  
"Me to!" Rose said.  
"What is it Pearl?" Aiber asked.  
"Well I was wondering what you do with the art? I mean its really pretty but it looks silly the way you have it set up."  
"Good question." Aiber said. "We sell it to on the black market."  
"Like on a computer." I asked that seemed like a logical way to get rid of these, but that would be trackable.  
"No." He said. "See under the city there are theses under ground tunnels. I know a few people who live there and they let me us in. There is a drop off point were our buyer leaves the money and then we leave the art. That way there is no way to trace it electronically." So he was as smart as I remembered, at least they gave it some thought.  
"But don't you think moving it leaves you more opened?" I asked.  
"Kind of, but we know we're good and not getting caught, so if someone is all that mean for us is its time to get a new buyer and drop spot. It would be a good scapegoat." Pearl laughed.  
"So your not changing even though you told us?" I asked.  
"No I see no reason to." He said.  
"I think that this has been quit enough sharing for one day." Wedy said.  
"I think we got everything that we need." Bob said.  
"Well it was nice talking to you." Aiber said. I followed Bob and Rose out to the car, Pearl lingered for a moment to talk but ran out to catch us so that we could all head home.

Near  
I sat on the bed. I had had all of the case files printed out and scattered around me the tv was working so it was playing the tape from the robbery over and over. Nothing was making any sense. A state of mind I was never very found of.  
"Near." Rester said. "Giavonni is almost back from picking up the task force from the NPA."  
"Good have them meet me up here." I informed him while barely looking back to acknowledge his presence.  
"Thats what I told them." Lidner walked in from the attached suite.  
"The computers are doing something very odd." She said making a disgruntled face.  
"Let me guess, there not working?" How odd now that its not me, they believe it.  
"Well thats part of it, but when they do turn on they keep going to the same web site."  
"Is it the home page?" Honestly sometimes her issues were so...  
"No, let me show you." She put the computer on the bed. It was showing a local news site.  
"Yes as I thought. Lidner you see at hotels they often set the wireless to direct you to something that is relevant to the area. Like news." Really this woman claimed to be doing her job? How hard was that to figure out?  
"But its not the news sites home page, its a random story. Apparently a bunch of kids go out driving and the letters E-T-E-L-E-D appear on there cars and in the area people are going missing."  
"Then maybe they set it like that as a warning. So that the visitors don't go missing."  
"Oh that makes sense." She said. "I guess I'll get back to work." She went back to the other room.  
"The task force are on there way up." Rester said.  
"Would you go meet them. Mr. Giavonni and you will put there stuff in there room so I can brief them."  
"Yes sir." He left leaving me to flip through my pages. I looked at the screen. Mr. Matsuda was talking to someone in the museum... Who was he talking to though? There was a knock on the door. "Come in." The door was locked so if they had a key it meant that I gave it to them. Mr. Aizawa, Mogi ad Ide walked in. "Hello." I said. "I'm sure that Mr. Aizawa has already given you a brief on why you are here." They nodded. "That one of your man is in some way connected to the crimes that are being committed. Have any of you had any contact with Mr. Matsuda?"  
"Not since Friday." Aizawa said.  
"But we left a lot of messages." Ide added.  
"I'm right to assume that you didn't mention anything about the investigation?"  
"I told them not to." Aizawa said. I looked at the other two men.  
"And you listened, correct?" Mogi elbowed Ide.  
"I may have said something that could have been seen as mentioning it." He said blushing.  
"Thank you for your honesty and we can hope that you didn't just ruin the case." I smiled at him. "Would you please call and try to do some form of damage control. There is no cell reception in the room so I would like you to step out side and do that." I picked up a toy robot that was sitting next to me. "Would the two of you have a look at this video." I pointed at the screen. "Hes talking to people that we can not see but what is strange is what he says." We watched silently.

"Shouldn't we stop them?" He said to no one there was a pause. "What do you mean?"

"From whats being said he does not sound guilty, but in that case why would his accomplices go to such lengths to hide there identity. I'm going to need you to bring him in for questioning."


	10. Chapter 10

Friday morning. Has it really been a whole week? no wonder I'm actually feeling used to life here. I lay in bed not wanting to get up yet. When the pounding came to the door as it always seemed to happen in the morning here.  
"Good morning." It wasn't Rose? that was strange. "Touta! Wake up." I tried to place the voice, who is it? Not Pearl either? Someone else from the building...  
"Lisa?" I guessed.  
"Thats right." She giggled. "I have a surprise for you."  
"What?" I said sitting up.  
"Its a surprise. I can't tell you." Hm well that should have been an obvious answer.  
"Give me a minute." It wasn't Rose so I wasn't to worried about what it was since she wasn't likely to have a crazy plan for my day in mind, I was just a little confused by her wanting me to come with her. I pulled on a new outfit quickly before heading out the door. Lisa was wearing one of her fetching outfits that I was still having trouble growing accustomed to, more lycra and leg wamers today. "Whats up?" I asked.  
"Someone is here to see you." Could they have found me!? It didn't seem possible as I hadn't left any track of myself anywhere in Portland so far...But still they could have...  
"Come on." She took my hand and led me to the other room. The room was oddly empty. Chief Yagami had to go back to work because of the disappearances. Pearl was watching television, for so a small child she sure watched a lot of news or tv in general. "Close your eyes." Lisa said.  
"Whats going on?" Pearl asked looking up over the top of the couch.  
"I really don't know." I said.  
"Just close your eyes." Lisa said. I did so reluctantly.  
"Now wait." I could hear her run to the door, pull it open and another person enter, both giggling. Who do I know who giggles?  
"Open your eyes!" Lisa and the new girl yelled. I opened my eyes at the sound of this new voice, which I knew for sure was one I had heard many times. Now in the room standing next to my neighbor was Misa Amane...  
"Matsu!" Misa yelled throwing her arms around me with her ever present enthusiasm.  
"Misa what are you doing here?!"  
"Well Misa was missing Matsu, so she came to see you." She said with a wide grin.  
"But how did you find me?" There was no way that she could have done that on her own. Could the others be setting me up in some way? But what would make them use Misa for a task like that?  
"Misa Misa is very smart." The two girls smiled.  
"Whos she?" Pearl asked still on her perched spot on the couch.  
"Shes a friend of mine from home." I guess thats what you could call Misa...  
"Best friends!" Misa added with another giggle and wrapping her arms around me once more. The door flew open as Rose burst in closely followed by Bob as she always seemed to be.  
"Who's the slut?" Rose asked not missing a beat.  
"Don't call her a slut." I said granted she wasn't the most mature dresser, but that was still a little mean for someone Rose had never met.  
"Shes your friend?" Rose asked. "Looking at her I would have thought that she was one of Lisa's friends for sure." Well they did seem to get along fairly good, which she was right that did figure as much.  
"No Misa and Matsu are friends." The smaller blond stuck out her chest as though getting ready to fight that taller one.  
"So are Rose and Matsu." She said with a slightly evil smile flipping her hair from her face as she turned to meet eyes with Pearl who laughed.  
"Really?" Misa said kind of backing down, clearly she had missed the sarcasm, it was better that way.  
"Yeah Rose and Matsu hang out all the time."  
"Don't make fun." Bob said, for once the voice of reason in a situation. "That happens to be a famous Japanese model slash actress." Hm I didn't think there were tons of people outside Japan who knew that?  
"Oh a slash." Rose now seemed to be unable to contain herself, the amount to make fun was apparently to much for her.  
"You've heard of her?" Lisa asked obviously she hadn't.  
"Yeah I'm a huge fan." Bob shrugged leaning against the door frame.  
"I would not have called that." Lisa said she clearly didn't believe him and thought he to was making fun of the other girl.  
"Me either." I said. Misa shock her head in agreement, but smiled and bobbed over to him.  
"Do you want Misa's autograph?" She giggled at him.  
"Maybe later." Bob said, Misa nodding her head.  
"But we seem to have diverged from the initial reason we came over." Rose said.  
"You had a reason?" Pearl asked.  
"Yeah we were gonna go to the park today."  
"Oh yeah!" Pearl jumped up from her spot and towards her two friends at the door.  
"Want to come Touta?" Bob asked. "I know I can't think of anything more fun then that."  
"Sure." I said. "Misa, Lisa how about you guys?"  
"Misa wants come!" She said jumping up and down in a very childish way.  
"It could be fun." Lisa said. "Why not." She shrugged. We all headed out to the car.  
"I think we're one over." Lisa said doing a quick head count. "There are six of us."  
"Pearl can sit on my lap." Bob offered.  
"Are you calling me fat?" Rose asked.  
"What are you talking about? In what way do you see any connection between those two statements?"  
"You didn't offer me." She pouted at him.  
"Oh in that case, yes your fat." He shot her a cocky smile.  
"Hey!" She smacked his arm turning away.  
"Rose would you like to sit on my lap?" Leaning in closer to try and make her turn back to look at him. She turned her head even more towards the car.  
"No thank you." She said with mock anger.  
"Pearl?" Bob turned back to the young girl who laughed.  
"Sure." She said.  
"Problem solved. By the way shoot gun!" He called racing towards the front passenger door before the blond girl could.  
"No fair." Rose said.  
"How so? I called it."  
"Still." She said slowly seeming to try and think of a reason why that wasn't fair.  
"What about Pearl?" I asked.  
"What about her?" Bob didn't seem to see a flaw in sitting next to me.  
"I thought she was going to sit with you."  
"Yeah and she is. I still don't see what the problem is."  
"Never mind." I climbed in the drivers seat, even though like always I had no idea where we were going. Bob and Pearl were next to me quickly and the three girls all piled into the back. Bob lead the way through side streets so not to make me take the highways I was not very found of, and we got there fairly quickly. We arrived in the park which was evidently located under a bridge and though it was louder than I would think most people liked parks, it was pretty with crisp green grass and tall over hanging trees. We all got out of the car.  
"Can I go play?" Pearl asked. We all nodded not really sure who she was addressing. "Yah!" She ran off in the field playing some kind of game I didn't understand.  
"Hey!" A girl called running in our direction. She was small with shoulder length dark hair, her dress which was oddly long for her how young she appeared to be reached all the way to her ankles.  
"Hey Thelma!" Bob said hugging the newest girl. "This is Thelma." He introduced though it was hardly needed with his greeting.  
"Hello." I said.  
"Hi." Misa said. "Why are you wearing such a bad dress it makes Misa very sad to see it."  
"Misa thats not very nice." Lisa sad. "You didn't like when Rose made fun of you." She pointed out in a tone that made it sound like she was talking to a little kid. Misa stuck out her lower lip out.  
"True, but Misa is just stating the truth so that poor Thelma knows and doesn't think that that is a good dress." She probably really did think that she was being helpful, knowing Misa I knew she wasn't really heartless, just not very bright at times.  
"Oh I know its not that normal." Thelma said. "But hey this is Portland."  
"What does that mean?" Misa screwed up her face.  
"Oh are you new here?" Thelma asked.  
"Yeah Misa just moved here."  
"Moved?" I said surprised, she hadn't mentioned that before had she?  
"Yeah Misa is going to stay here." She said excitedly.  
"What?" I tried to continue my inquiry but Rose butt in before I could.  
"Anyone want to go hiking?" She asked loudly.  
"Sure." Thelma said with an enthusiastic smile to the group.  
"Someone come play tag!" Pearl yelled.  
"I'll stay with Pearl." Lisa said.  
"You two?" Bob offered.  
"Misa doesn't like hiking."  
"I'll stay with you." I offered.  
"Yah." She said.  
"Well were off then." Bob waved as they left.  
"Lisa!" Pearl called.  
"I guess I should go. Nothing like a game of tag." She ran over and tagged the younger girl.  
"So Matsu." Misa said sitting down. "Why are you all the way here?"  
"Why are you?" I asked back to her, she rolled her eyes with a laugh.  
"No fair Misa asked first."  
"Yeah, but its a little weird you showing up and all."  
"Misa can't come and visit her good friend Matsu."  
"Really?"  
"No, I'm here to see someone else but I heard that you were here so I came to see you."  
"And your planing to stay?"  
"Misa's gonna move in with him, her friend not Matsu." She assured me quickly.  
"Oh I see." There did seem to be a lot of people we knew here, it made some sense.  
"So Misa's turn, why is Matsu here?"  
"I needed some time away from work."  
"Mastu doesn't like work?"  
"Not really theses days."  
"Everyone was really worried, they even called Misa to see if she had heard anything." She giggled. "Oh I was told if I saw you to pass on a message."  
"What was it?"  
"Call Motichi immediately or he is going to kill you." She said in her best Aizawa voice.  
"I guess I can do that. If they were calling you they must be pretty desperate." I laughed. She nodded.  
"Thats what Misa thought." I was suddenly hit by a weight as Pearl threw herself on my lap.  
"I'm on base!" She yelled.  
"Theres no base!" Lisa yelled.  
"Then I need a break." Pearl said moving to the ground.  
"Ok then." Lisa sat down as well. "So... How do you two know each other?" She signaled the two of us.  
"Work I guess." I said. "How about Thelma? How do you guys know her?" She must have come to meet us here since she was already in the park when we arrived.  
"Shes dating Bobs roommate." Lisa said. "You still haven't met him have you?" I shook my head. "I'm sure you will, you can't miss him. Hes got a... Presences."  
"Hes mean and loud." Pearl corrected.  
"But Thelma is really nice." Lisa said. "They balance."  
"True." Pearl said. "Like Bob and Rose."  
"There a couple?" I asked. Pearl and Lisa laughed.  
"Of course." Lisa said. "But they are so much more normal since they got each other."  
"Rose normal?" That was not a statement I ever expected to hear.  
"More normal." Lisa corrected. "She used to wear wooden clogs and swim in duck pounds, that kind of crazy."  
"Really?"  
"Oh yeah. And Bob he just didn't do much at all. So I think that they have really helped each other." Lisa said. "Anyways... Off break." She tagged Pearl. "Your it."

Near  
Days and there had been no real progress. We were trying to find him in anyway possible, but apparently he was untraceable. Our teams had actually taken a whole day putting up posters claiming that he was a missing person, which was more our less true. There were phones set up around the room taking calls, not that anyone had any real information that could possibly help us.  
"Near." I looked over at Aizawa.  
"Yes Mr. Aizawa?"  
"I was wondering if you had another plan. I mean if no one calls."  
"Optimistic I see." I said rolling my eyes. "Of course I have other plans but I think that at this time we should be handling this as low key as possible. I'm sure that you don't want to make a big scene, do you Mr. Aizawa?"  
"No I don't, I just want us to find him." One of the phones rang, Ide answered. We all watched.  
"Hello." He said. "You saw him...When was that.. And your sure it was him... and where was that... and you have reason to believe that he will be there tomorrow... thank you so much." He hung up the phone smiling.  
"Good news I suppose." I said.  
"Yeah that woman said that hes working at a market downtown. She said that she had talked to him and that he should be there tomorrow."  
"Well it looks like we don't need another plan, now do we?" I said.


	11. Chapter 11

**Authors note: **I just wanted to say thank you to those who commented for all their lovely comments, and to all those who read each week, thanks to everyone we update weekly. Sorry this one is a little later then usual. Hope you all had fun st. Patricks day.

Saturday morning. I walked out of my room dressed and ready for a day of work as I had last week. The chief was in the kitchen nook at the stove apparently serving breakfast to the many occupants of our living room. Pearl was as always in front of the television on the edge of the leather couch gripping it in excitement, though the program didn't appear to be of any interest to Bob who was sitting next to her staring vacantly at his video game with an unlit cigarette hanging in his lips. At the counter island Rose was chatting away with Thelma who apparently was still here from yesterday, she must have stayed with Bob...Or rather his roommate who I had still yet to meet, oddly enough as I seemed to spend most days with him, Rose and now Thelma as well...  
"Good morning." The chief said throwing a handful of cheese into the pan that he was holding over the stove.  
"Morning." I said sitting down in front of him at the counter. "When did you get back?" I leaned forward cocking my head to listen.  
"Late last night." He told me using his spatula to flip the contents of his pan again. "Want an omelet?"  
"Sure." it was a novel thing, this whole having meals made for me and stuff like that, it was something that I hadn't experienced since moving out of my parents house years ago...  
"Any preferences to what goes in?"  
"No, I'll eat anything."  
"Your the only one. Pearl hate tomatoes, Bob cilantro, Thelma onions, and Rose eggs." I screwed up my face looking to the ever bizarre blond.  
"Eggs?" Wasn't this an omelet that we were talking about?  
"Its Rose what do you expect." He shrugged.  
"Hey are you making fun of me?" Rose asked moving closer to so that she could poke me.  
"Well the eggs kind of make it an omelet." I pointed out only to be given a condescending look.  
"Not true."  
"Then what does?"  
"Well, cheese." She said as though this was very obvious, but like most things that she said it wouldn't be to anyone else.  
"So your just eating cheese with vegetable in it." The chief nodded trying not to laugh as well, even he couldn't help finding whimsy with her antics.  
"Correction I already ate that, but yes."  
"Thats gross." I said.  
"So are you but I don't complain." She laughed. Chief handed me a plate.  
"Thank you." There was a knock on the door as Misa and Lisa walked in. In a pair their clothing stuck out as strange even more than it did by itself, as she always was Misa had on Gothic Lolita attire, today's seemed to be a Victorian doll dress minus the skirt, as opposed to Lisa whose looked more like it would have fit into that terrible 80s movie about the dance girl who was a welder or something like that.  
"Good morning." They called in cheerful unison.  
"Morning." We chorused back at them, less unison than the two of them.  
"Omelet?" Chief asked. The two of sat with us at the counter.  
"Sure, no meat." Lisa said propping herself on her elbows.  
"And Misa doesn't like mushrooms, they're fungus and that's disgusting, like eating feet." He laughed at least he could take Misa in stride, which I always had been able to but a lot of the police task force was easily annoyed by her, or maybe that was just Aizawa...  
"Alright." He smiled at her.  
"This sucks." Pearl said disgruntled falling back against the cushions and letting out a huff.  
"Whats wrong?" Lisa asked sounding concerned, she was so young looking but had a really motherly feel about her most of the time.  
"There hasn't been any coverage on the news. You know about the art theft." She said defeated.  
"We know who did it." I pointed out, maybe the police were closing in on who had, if they were conducting something secretly than there would be less coverage for sure, I knew that no officer wanted unneeded outside help on a case and it was easier to do that without press on their tails all the time.  
"That's not the point though." Pearl said stomping a foot on the area rug.  
"Don't worry." Thelma said. "We're heading over to help with the investigation today we can update you on what the investigators are thinking."  
"Are you supposed to do that?" I asked, somehow I had always figured that they were lying when they said that they were supposed to be helping catch the thief...  
"What does that have to do with it." Bob asked, oh so maybe he was lying...  
"Well..." Well your getting in the way of an official investigation being conducted by professionals.  
"Listen, my friend you see he's not so much about doing things the way that they should be done, he's more about results."  
"So your friend is in charge of the investigation?"  
"Yeah something like that." He shrugged. That made me nervous. "But... Speaking of that particular matter I do believe that we should get going." Rose and Thelma stood up.  
"Your going Rose?" I asked, a real group of police officers didn't seem like they would enjoy having Rose's antics going on in the background at all times.  
"Yeah, can't you tell." She motioned to her clothing, she had on a slinky dress and long trench coat before striking an over dramatic pose with her hand on her forehead..  
"Why are you dressed like that?" Though I should have known not to ask, as it would have a involved explanation.  
"Because there is a crime being solved. Think film noir." I nodded still confused. "I tried to get everyone else to dress up but they are just to lame for that."  
"Its sad." Bob said. "But I just don't think my legs would look good in that dress."  
"I didn't tell you to dress like me. You could have worn a suit and fedora." She rolled her eyes as though that was totally obviously what you would wear to probably go to a crime scene.  
"I don't own one." With his laid back sense of style that would figure some how...  
"I do." And so would that...  
"Yeah you would." He laughed shaking his head as he shoved his video game in his pocket, and pulling out a lighter.  
"Whats that supposed to mean?"  
"Guys we have to get going." Thelma pointed out looking at her watch, she must know them well since she could tell as well as the rest of us that this discussion could go on forever.  
"Don't think that I'm going to drop this." Rose said pointing at Bob as they headed out the door.  
"So Mr. Yagami will give Misa a ride today, right?" Misa asked looking at him as she started eating her food which had just been placed in front of her.  
"Where are you going?" I asked, he hadn't mentioned leaving again, but he was in and out a lot.  
"Back to work." He said. "But I should be back by tomorrow."  
"Why are you going?" I asked Misa.  
"Misa's friends live there. So Mr. Yagami is going to bring Misa to see them. That's were she is going to stay." She said smiling.  
"You have called them, right?" The chief asked, that seemed like an odd question.  
"No, silly, I'm going to surprise them."  
"Are you sure that that is the best idea?"  
"Yeah, why not?" The chief sighed.  
"I should probably get going to." Lisa said standing up. "Pearl." She motioned for her. Pearl got up looking unhappy.  
"What are you guys doing today?" I asked.  
"We are going to clean Pearls house." Lisa said begrudgingly. "Doesn't that sound fun?"  
"No." Pearl said huffing.  
"We have to find June first cause shes helping too." Lisa added. "Lets get going." The older girl grabbed the younger's hand as they left.  
"I think I have to get going to work." I said looking at the clock on the oven. I stood up. "Bye guys."  
"Wait Matsu." Misa hugged me. "You have to make sure that you come to see Misa when she moves." I nodded.  
"Alright I can visit sometime, Chief Yagami goes there all the time."  
"Oh yeah." Misa laughed.  
"Oh by the way where is it that you go?"  
"Buncom, but we have to go."  
"Me to."  
"Ok, Have fun at work." She said, I waved as I headed down to Cassie's apartment. She was talking to Brandon in front of the door.  
"I'm going with him." Cassie said.  
"When is it?" Brandon asked.  
"Tomorrow, its an all day event." She sighed.  
"That sounds awful."  
"No love there not that bad." She looked over at me. "Oh gosh we have to get going. Brandon is coming to help set up."  
"Oh cause Bob isn't?"  
"Yeah." She said, Brandon rolled his eyes as he got in the front seat. I got in the back thankful to not be driving for the first time in a while. "How are you doing?" Cassie asked.  
"I'm good, how about you?" I said trying to continue the small talk.  
"I'm alright, I'm going with my dad to a event with his platoon."  
"Oh is that what what you were talking about?"  
"Yeah, they have them about once a month. There kind of fun there are some nice people there." She smiled and we fell into silence. We drove along the increasingly familiar streets to the downtown lots that would soon be filed with vendors. With the three of us setting up the small tent style booth we were done in moments, than we helped Cassie place her table and chairs in the tent. Brandon left just as people were starting to trickle into the pathways that went between the many booths. I waved as he walked away, then took my seat so I could write down names, though I still did not think that what she was doing was particularly honest work and was not that happy to be a part of it. Many of the people who were having me take names I recognized from the previous week, they all seemed to so happy when they left that it almost made me feel less bad about helping Cassie with what she was doing, it wasn't honest or right, but at least I knew she did research which meant at least the stuff she said was based in fact. I leaned back in my seat as another person walked away with a cheerful smile pressing my eyes closed for a moment while I knew Cassie would have the current costumer busy. As the day wore on the place started to get more and more crowded.  
"Is that him?" I heard a distinct voice ask, distinct because I knew it. Oh damn...  
"Oh yeah I think it is." Another voice I also recognized.  
"Fortune telling." The first voice scoffed with a laugh. I looked over to see Mogi talking to Ide amongst the crowd that was lined up to see Cassie.  
"Shut up hes right there, he'll hear you." Ide said smacking his co-worker.  
"So what? Its not like theres anyway that he doesn't find it funny."  
"What if hes into that kind of stuff now?" I couldn't help but laugh. I was mad that they had tracked me, but also surprisingly glad to see them, maybe it wouldn't be so bad to see the two of them again.  
"Guys." I said getting their attention.  
"Oh." Ide looked over at me. "Hi." Mogi wave.  
"So is it just the two of you?" I asked looking back quickly to make sure that the costumer was still busy, and he thankfully appeared to be still immersed in the conversation.  
"No Aizawa is back at the hotel." Ide explained.  
"I would have thought that he would want to be the first one to yell at me."  
"Yeah thats why we made him stay back at the hotel." Ide laughed. I nodded, it was way better that I didn't have to face him just yet, after our phone calls I didn't think I was ready to hear what he had to say to me...  
"Thank you."  
"Who are you talking to?" Cassie asked looking over as her customer finished thanking her, apparently he was closer to done then I had thought.  
"Oh they're some of my friends from home." I said.  
"If you want to take your lunch break you can." She said with a smile directed at both me and the other two men I was talking too.  
"Thank you." I said standing up to take my leave. I joined my two friends. "Do you guys want to grab some thing to eat?"  
"Sure." Ide said.  
"There are food stands on the other side of train tracks." There was a train that went through the middle of the market and the rest of down town, a slow moving commuter train so it didn't make to much noise thankfully since we worked nearby.  
"Is there anything thats not like...Um..." Mogi motioned to the surrounding vendors. "So..."  
"Hippish." I suggested, it surely wasn't what we were used to, and not what I ever would have associated with American food.  
"Yeah." He said.  
"Yeah theres hot dogs." I lead the way to a stand selling hot dogs and lemonade that was set up next to a store that sold Australian imports. We took our food and sat down by a fountain which had two standing statues holding a basin that poured water into a lower pool which people lined the rim of. "So how did you guys find me?" I asked.  
"Dinner!" Ide yelled, I raised an eyebrow.  
"What?" I said.  
"We traced your call when you talked to Aizawa." Mogi said sending a whithering stare to Ide.  
"Yeah I knew that but Portland's not that small."  
"We put up posters." Mogi said.  
"Oh yeah that would do it. Wait what was that thing about dinner?"  
"We wanted to come over for dinner." Ide said staring down at the paper plate in his hands.  
"Why?" Its not like I didn't wanna spend time with them, after spending so much time together on the Kira case I had grown to enjoy spending time with them. But it did seem a little out of no where as I hadn't seen them in weeks...  
"Cause..."  
"Because we came to visit you." Mogi said.  
"Oh yeah, sure." I said. "I guess you can come over tomorrow. You can meet some of my friends who I live with there... Funny." I guess that would be a good description of them.  
"So did you know them before?" Mogi asked.  
"Oh no I met them here."  
"And live with them?" I nodded. "Like in the same house?"  
"No apartment building." I said. "But its funny cause I see them all the time even though we only live in the same building."  
"That is odd." Ide said.  
"I know but I like it."  
"Who are they?" Ide said kinda blurting it out.  
"Who do I live with?"  
"Yeah." Mogi said.  
"Oh well there a bunch of them I mostly hang out with Bob, Rose and Pearl."  
"Do you know there last names?"  
"Only Rose, hers is Jenkins. Wait why are you asking?"  
"No reason!" Ide said defensively.  
"I think that I need to get back to work." I said feeling that this was somehow odd...  
"Alright then." Mogi said. They walked with me back to the stall, where we said good bye planning to see each other the next day.

Near

I stopped the recording device that was attached to the two NPA agents we had sent to the Portland Saturday Market, glad that our equipment was actually working today.  
"Your officers almost gave us away." I said turning over to look at Aizawa who was sitting in a chair, I was on the floor.  
"Sorry I'll make sure to talk to them about that." By the annoyed look on his face it was obvious the he really would.  
"Yes that would be good. We can't have tomorrow looking like that if we plan to bug the apartment." The two men had been in charge of getting access to his house to see if that would lead to any clues. "Mr. Rester." I called. The man walked in from the other room. "You and Mr. Giovanni are going to be in charge of the equipment tomorrow, and make sure that it works properly, I don't want us missing anything that happens in Mr. Matsuda's house." There was a crash as a lamp fell off a table. "Who hit that?" The other men looked at each other before shaking there heads. Of course typical...  
"Near." Giovanni said walking in the door. He had been working in the lobby because at least the internet seem to work there. "I ran that name Rose Jenkins, It turns out that she is some kind of activist, shes mentioned in several blogs, she seems to have been fairly involved. I couldn't find an address but she has a sister who lives in town." He turned the screen showing a picture of a girl wearing a the most obscene array of clothing, she had long blond hair on the top of her head, and worn three different dresses layer with what appeared to be Irish dancing shoes. She was sitting on a platform in a tree.  
"Thank you." I said, an activist... yes that did make some level of sense, I suppose there could be some way to justify stealing in the mind of a tree sitter... but still I would have thought that we were dealing with really high end criminals, not a young girl trying to prove something to authority. Either way we had another lead.


	12. Chapter 12

The phone was ringing as I woke up, I blinked rubbing the sleep from my eyes as I began to grasp the sound I was hearing. I shuffled out of my room and into the living room which was empty, something that I had never had happen in the morning while staying here, odd really I wonder where everyone was today? I grabbed the phone from its hook on the kitchen counter.

"Hello." I said groggily scrubbing a hand over my face.

"Hello Matsuda." It was the chief, I looked around the room, hm I had been expecting him to return last night wonder what was up?

"Why aren't you back yet?" I asked sinking to a stool and propping my chin up on an elbow.

"Thats what I'm calling about. Theres a hold up here so I won't be getting back for a bit."

"What kind of hold up?" I asked.

"The locals are worried about how the disappearances are going to affect Buncom day." I blew out a puff of air, clearly he wasn't as concerned about such an event but more about the actual disappearances...

"Whats Buncom day?" Sounded kinda hooky to me...

"Its a local celebration of the town."

"Oh I see." Yeah that would figure somehow, sounds like something to be real concerned about, no wondered he sounded annoyed, sometimes having to deal with locals in an area could be hard.

"So I'll be back later tonight hopefully. I'll see you than."

"Yeah alright see you." I heard the phone go dead. So I guess he wouldn't be coming to dinner, that might have been for the better, he would probably have scared them anyways they would find out eventually, but maybe it was okay to wait. That explains him, but than where was everyone else who was normally was swarming me the moment I woke up? I guess I should see if anyone else wants to come to dinner tonight. When I got outside Lisa was standing with June in front of her apartment, well at least there was someone. I walked over the small group.

"Hey there." Lisa said smiled waving as I approached them.

"Hi." I said. "Hi June." She didn't answer, she simply looked vacantly in the opposite direction, not that was unexpected. "What are you guys up to today?"

"Ado and me are bring Pearl and June to see some relatives." The man and younger girl who she had just mentioned walked out of the apartment.

"So your all not going to be around today?"

"No sorry." Lisa said.

"Its alright." I looked around. "Have any of you seen Rose or Bob?" It was strange to not see them, most days their ever so slight oppressive presence was everywhere, not that I really minded that much...

"They went to the beach with Thelma and her boyfriend, they left this morning." Pearl said. "Something about all wanting to spend time together since they never see each other, or something like that." The young girl rolled her eyes, clearly she didn't think that was the case.  
"Really?" Lisa said looking confused. "Are they at the Oar House?"  
"Yeah, I think so." Pearl said fast. Hm, odd wonder why she was so defensive about her information on where they went?  
"Who are you visiting?" I asked.  
"I was going to see my dad." Pearl said. I nodded, her dad? Somehow I had assumed that her father wasn't alive as she clearly didn't live with, and it seemed odd to entrust June with anyone when a parent was still living. Maybe he worked a lot or something... "He doesn't live that far away."  
"We should getting going if we're going to catch our train." Ado said reaching out to take the little girl's outstretched hand.  
"Sorry that we have to miss your dinner thing." Lisa said sympathetically. I nodded before realizing I hadn't mentioned that to her.  
"How'd you know about that?" Had I mentioned it at all?  
"Lets go." Pearl took the other girl's hand as well and started to pull her down the stairs. That was strange, everyone seems to be busier than normal. I walked down the stairs to see if I could find anything one else who was still around today.  
"So your coming with me kid?" Gary had walked over as I reached the bottom of the staircase.  
"I'm not going anywhere." I informed him confused by the sudden assult by the older man.  
"What don't lie to me boy!" He punched my arm. "I know that you are! My daughter told me."  
"Father." Cassie ran over to us pulling him away from me slightly and squeezing his shoulder lightly. "Sorry there love." She said to me with a half hearted smile that told me she had been being harassed by her father a lot today.  
"Why are you apologizing to this boy, first he says he'll come with me then he goes and says that he wouldn't!"  
"Dad that was Brandon." She informed her father slowly, oh he thought I was someone else...Not that I was sure how he could mix up me and an American man with shaggy blond hair, not a lot of similarities I could spot honestly...Though I wasn't sure how right in the head Gary was.  
"Brandon who?"  
"Brandon, he was the person who was going with you." Cassie had that sound about her like they had already had this discussion many times, which knowing him they probably had. "Now why don't you go get ready."  
"Right." The man stocked off and back into his hatch.  
"I'm so sorry."  
"Thats alright." I said. "Your going with your dad to that thing, right?" I asked still hopeful that there might be anyone else in the building by the evening.  
"No, Brandon is going with him." Thats not what they said yesterday, and Brandon hadn't sounded like he wanted to go either, strange...  
"Why aren't you going?" I asked.  
"Oh, you know its really more of a boys club honestly. Normally I would just deal and go but if I can convince someone else to go I'm happier with that." She laughed. A van pulled up and a young man jumped out of the passenger door.  
"Hi Cassie." He called running over. "Is Gary ready to go?" This was one of Gary's war buddies? I could have sworn that he had fought in like Vietnam or something like that, but I guess that this could be a son of one the soldiers who he had fought with...  
"Hes just finishing up." The boy nodded. "I'll be right back, I need to grab Brandon." She said slipping away and into the other man's apartment.  
"Your the new guy here, right?" The boy asked.  
"Yeah, thats me. I guess." Wow that seemed odd that he would know about me? Maybe he was friends with Cassie or something like that. "So how do you know Gary?"  
"We were in the same platoon." Oh I guess Gary must have fought in a more recent war then I thought, or maybe more than one by how odd he seemed to be. I nodded.  
"So what are you guys doing today?"  
"Just hanging out, we're heading up to Pittock Mansion. Its this cool old building that you can host events at." The boy informed me.  
"Not ready to go I see." Gary said as he joined us.  
"I'm ready, we were waiting on you." He laughed waving off Gary's attack, clearly they knew each other well so if that was his reaction.  
"Excuses boy. Get in the car." The boy rolled his eyes.  
"Yes sir." He gave a salute and walked back with a quick wave.  
"Back." Cassie said as she practically dragged Brandon over to her father. "Have fun."  
"Oh yeah like that could happen." Brandon said leaving with the old man, shoulders slumped.  
"So," Cassie turned to me. "Dinner?"  
"Yeah, I'm having some friends over, but why does everyone know that?"  
"Its a small building." She shrugged clapping her hands together.  
"I guess so." That could explain it I guess, maybe I had said something and forgotten...  
"I was wondering, I know that it was short notice and everything, so if you want I'll make something."  
"No I can do it." It wasn't really my thing, but I could figure it out probably.  
"No its my pleasure, please I would love to do dinner for you and your friends." She said taking my hand and squeezing it in the overly familiar way she always treated everyone.  
"I guess..."  
"No I told you as the person in charge of this place, please."  
"But..."  
"No, just meet your friends down at my place."  
"Wait..."  
"I have to run to the store." She turned to her car. "See you love." That was odd, I mean it wasn't that I was ungrateful to have dinner made for me, or to have a already prepared house to have them meet me in, it was still strange for her to be so willing...Maybe she just enjoyed entertaining or something like that. I guess I might as well talk to the last of my neighbors. I walked over to their door. Knocking lightly, I didn't know them as well as others, but we had talked some, and this seemed to be how things worked in this place.  
"Hello." Shingo said opening the door.  
"Hi." I said.  
"We're busy today, sorry." Wow everyone really did know, and always his bluntness was showing through.  
"Shingo I don't want to go to Buttertoes." Reiji said as he came to the door pushing the door opened a little more so that he could face his roommate. "Oh hello." He said noticing me.  
"I know and that is why we are going to LOTUS later tonight because you insisted." He emphasized the last word, rolling his eyes to show how little he wanted to go to this place.  
"Well you insisted that we enter a restaurant called Buttertoes." Reiji pointed out flipping his long dark over his shoulder dramatically.  
"And your going to be the one to regret this because your going to have to see me and Suguru at a club."  
"Good point. That could just be sad." He scoffed.  
"Did you really just come over here to complain again? I am talking to someone." Shingo motioned to me.  
"No I didn't, I can't find that book I borrowed. Do you know where it is?"  
"Yeah I'll grab it. Sorry." Shingo said as he turned back into the apartment in search of the book in question.  
"Everyone seems to be busy today, you guys don't happen to know why?" I said. Reiji laughed.  
"You really haven't figured out why everyone is leaving?" He raised a manicured eyebrow.  
"No." I shook my head.  
"Need I remind you that we are all in the witness protection program, as far as most of the world is concerned we are all dead." He said waving his hands to indicate his words.  
"Oh, yeah, I forgot." Duh, that would figure and I couldn't believe I hadn't thought of that before. Than why didn't anyone else just say that?  
"And as nice as your friends are I'm sure... You can just never be to careful, you know?" That did make some sense. "I thought that it was silly to have us all lie but they all were being ridiculous and insisted, hence the sending him out of the room, no one wants me to tell you. So you understand?"  
"Yeah." He had a good point, it really didn't make sense to not tell me, but I guess they had their reasons.  
"The book was on the table." Shingo said returning to the doorway.  
"Oh I must have missed it." Reiji shrugged taking the book from his outstretched hand. "We better get going."  
"Oh sorry." I stepped aside. "Have fun then."  
"Thank you." The shorter haired man said. So I guess its just me and Cassie, how strangely surreal.

Aizawa:  
We parked the car in front of the house two of Near's men were with me, Lidner and Giovanni. I would have preferred to have my own men with me but they were preparing to go over to Matsuda's house. Near was busy trying to make sure that all of the equipment worked for later today. For now the recording device I was wearing lead to Roger who was apparently staying in a undisclosed location, and whose equipment actually seemed to be working. We pulled up to a quaint little white house, surrounding its perfectly green lawn was a picket fence, wow that was a little to much sickeningly cute this woman we were seeing was clearly trying very hard at being normal American. We climbed out of the car walking up the path.  
"This doesn't look like somewhere a thief would live." Lidner pointed out eying a plastic bubble car on the porch.  
"Well its not." Giovanni pointed out. "I mean we are looking into her sister, not the girl we think could be actually stealing."  
"Oh good point." The woman said.  
"Plus you can't judge a person by there landscaping." I pointed out, more suburban places than this had been the headquarters of many operations, I had seen it happen.  
"Yeah I know." She said taking the lead up to the porch. She knocked on the door.  
"Remember this is only an inquiry." I said. The door opened revealing a woman with short blond hair, mid twenties with large green eyes. Other than her clean cut appearance this girl was identical to one we were looking for, the case file had said they were twins though I hadn't been expecting them to be identical ones.  
"Hello, how can I help you?" She asked through the screen door.  
"Hello," I said stepping forward. "I'm here as part of an investigation, we have a few questions for you." I flipped open an ID to let her know who I was.  
"Oh," the woman looked slightly taken aback. "Come in." She let us in. She really didn't seem guilty. Definitely not a hard core criminal but hey sometimes you find them in the strangest places I think the Kira case made that really clear... We sat down on a white couch in the middle of the overly clean room. "Can I get you anything?" The woman asked.  
"We shouldn't be here that long." I said.  
"Are you sure?"  
"Sure." Lidner said, standing up to talk to the other woman. "By the way my name is Lidner, your Agatha, right?"  
"Yes." She smiled.  
"Its nice to meet you. These are Giovanni and Aizawa." Lidner motioned to us. "We are so sorry to have to bother you, but we are only going to be a few minutes so you don't have to get us anything."  
"Are you sure I think I have some cookies in the kitchen." The young blond woman said scrunching up her pale freckled features.  
"Well if you already have some then how can we say no."  
"Alright I'll get them. Do you need anything to drink milk or water?" God this was becoming tedious...  
"Maybe some water I can help you get it." The female officer said.  
"Thank you." Agatha said and the two of them left to another room. Hmm I guess making people feel comfortable was never really my strong point, I thought feeling glad to have brought the girl with us. When they returned they were talking not about the case, yeah that was never my thing I was ready to just get this over with. Lidner sat back down with us and the other woman in a chair across.  
"So... what was it that you needed to talk to me about?" Agatha asked looking more relaxed.  
"We wanted to know about your sister." I said.  
"My sister?" She asked raising an eyebrow.  
"Yes is there something wrong with that?" Giovanni asked leaning forward.  
"Well my sister died a year ago." She said fidgeting uncomfortably in her chair and avoiding our eyes.  
"Dead?" I asked, well that would definitely make it hard for her to be involved in the current case.  
"Yeah dead." The girl nodded. "She fell out of a tree."  
"When was that again?" Giovanni asked.  
"It was a year ago. I have the obituary somewhere." Agatha looked sadly around the room as though hoping the item she was talking about would be nearby.  
"Its alright." Lidner said. "We're really sorry to have to talk about this."  
"Its alright." She said. "What was it that you needed to know about her?"  
"Well." I thought judging from what we we're hearing this must be the wrong Rose Jenkins, cause if Matsuda knew her than there was no way she had died last year. "Do you know if she knew a Touta Matsuda?" Its worth a shot, maybe he had been in correspondences for her...  
"The name doesn't ring a bell." She said. "But I can't claim to know all of her friends." I tried to think if there was anything else.  
"I guess that's it." I said, she clearly wasn't aware of much that her sister had done even before her death.  
"Well, I'm sorry that I couldn't be more help." Yeah just a dead end, but it wouldn't help anyone to tell her that.  
"Thats alright." The other two were telling her. After a brief discussion that I wasn't particularly interested in being part of we managed to leave, cookies in hand as the Agatha had insisted. Well all the good that did us... This whole case just kept leading to more confusion.


	13. Chapter 13

**Sorry this one is a day latter then usual, but I'm going to have to switch to updating on Wednesdays. Hope you enjoy. **

I walked down the stairs to Cassie's apartment. It still felt weird that she would be the one hosting the event. I mean I think that I could probably handle it but I guess it was odd to refuse help even if it was a little out of the blue. I knocked on the door.  
"Come in!" I heard her call from somewhere inside the apartment. I pushed the door open, I had never been in the room before it was interestingly put together with scarves draping over the lights and a carved wooden star on the wall, a lot like the hippy items sold at Saturday market. She was busy in the kitchen. I leaned down on the L shaped island, there were several pots on the stove boiling away.  
"You know that it is just two of my friend coming over, I think." I actually don't know if Aizawa was coming with them as they hadn't been to clear on that point when we spoke...  
"I know but you can never have to much food."  
"What are you even making?" I asked trying to get a better look at what was being made though I honestly didn't recognize any of it.  
"We have some curry hash and salmon and lentils" She shrugged. "You know basic food."  
"I don't think that is what most people would consider basic, I don't think I even know what hash is."  
"It is a potato dish, but have you called your friends?" She asked not looking away from the stove as she spoke to me.  
"Why?" I asked confused.  
"Well have you told your friends were to meet you, you know since we changed locations." Oh I hadn't done that yet.  
"Good point." I said. I pulled out my phone dialing Ide's number. I fidgeted as I waited for the phone to stop ringing.  
"Hello." He said.  
"Hey." I answered. "I realized that I forgot to tell you were to meet me at the house." I had given them the address yesterday and totally neglected to tell them which apartment to meet me in, clever as always I though miserably.  
"Yeah we are almost there and were wondering, we figured you would have like put balloons out or something." I crinkled up my nose, it might have been a jab at me but it wouldn't have been a bad idea as I was to spacey to remember to tell them where to meet me!  
"That would have been clever." I heard someone say something that I couldn't make out behind him.  
"Oh yeah so what house number was it?"  
"I need to check just a sec."  
"You don't know where you live?" He sounded almost worried, that would be bad if I didn't know that I suppose...  
"Shut up." I said looking out the front door. "Oh its apartment 1. Funny I should have figured."  
"Idiot."  
"Hey, we aren't eating at my house, its a friends who lives in the building!"  
"Fine I guess thats better." He laughed.  
"Thats all, I was just calling to make sure you knew."  
"Okay."  
"Yeah cool see you in a few minutes."  
"Yep."  
"Bye." I said hanging up the phone.

Aizawa:  
"Ide do we really need that much small talk." I said rolling my eyes.  
"Sorry." He said squirming and looking away from me. At least we got the information that we needed, but why had he not told them where to meet originally? I guess it was just Matsuda being forgetful or something, he wasn't always the most reliable person on the planet.  
"This is the address." Gevanni said from the front seat where him and Mogi were sitting. The place was a dump, the paint was literally falling off the house and almost every room seemed to have shattered windows. What the hell? This can't be where hes living, even for him that seems odd.  
"This can't be the place." Mogi said joining us in the back and chiming in on my thought process, Ide nodded his agreement. "I mean it is an apartment, but I don't think that anyone could really be living in this."  
"There are some lights on." Ide pointed out. That was true, this was just getting stranger and stranger by the moment, not that the whole thing wasn't insane from the very beginning...The more I learned the more I wasn't sure what to think!  
"Right so I guess this is it." We did a double check of the two man's wires that they were wearing. "Alright it looks like the two of you are ready but do you know what you are not going to do." They shrugged. "YOUR NOT GOING TO BE SO OBVIOUS THAT IT ACTUALLY HURTS TO LISTEN TO!" They nodded, or rather Mogi nodded and Ide looked guilty that I was talking to him. "Good now get going." They climbed out the back door. "They're moving in." I said pushing a button to talk to the unit back at the hotel.

Near:  
I can't say that I really understood the words that came through the intercom, but I think the gist was that the plan was in action. "Very good." I said into my head set. "Commander Rester there doesn't happen to be any chance that the visual is working?" I asked irratated by the fact that I was almost completely cut off from the men in the van.  
"Actually." He pressed a button pulling the image of the outside of an old building on to the television, it was fuzzy but compared to everything else not bad. "Its working better then the sound."  
"About that Lidner?" I turned to her.  
"I'm working on it." She said slightly desperately.  
"How hard is it? Its just a direct feed from a tap that has been placed on Mr. Ide and Mr. Mogi."  
"I know but my computer keeps turning off." She said hitting the key board. "Shit. It did it again."  
"Is it plugged in?" I asked rolling my eyes and messaging my temples, really wasn't this her job?  
"Yeah." The woman said double checking. "It is."  
"Then make it work." She nodded going back to the computer and staring at it.  
"I will." She said slouching over. I really hope that they are getting better reception in the van as at least that meant someone was doing their job correctly, I would just have to be grateful that Gevanni could get his equipmen to work correctly... I watched the television as the two men knocked on the door to an unit on the bottom floor.

Matsuda:  
There was a knock on the door. That must be them they really weren't that far away I guess. I opened the door letting my friends in.  
"Hi." I said half waving. They were looking around. "This is my friend Cassie's house." I indicated to where she was in the kitchen. "Um Cassie this is Ide and Mogi."  
"Dinner is almost ready." She said smiling waving to the two men who I had just indicated.  
"It smells good." Mogi said.  
"Thank you." She said. "You can make yourselves at home, I can take you jackets."  
"Thank you." He said handing it to her.  
"You?" Cassie offered Ide.  
"Oh yeah thanks." He did the same. She went and placed them behind a Chinese screen in the corner.  
"So is it just the four of us?" Ide asked.  
"Yeah the others were all busy." I said.  
"Others?" Mogi asked.  
"Yeah, everyone in the building." I explained.  
"You invited the whole building?" Ide asked.  
"Yeah. Why not?" I asked cocking my head, they were all in my house like everyday it would have seemed rude to not. "But they were all busy."  
"Your so naive."  
"Why?"  
"They might just have not wanted to come over."  
"Hey, they're my friends."  
"You've known them a week." He pointed out rolling his eyes at me, like I hadn't thought about that, but even if it seemed like to little time to know anyone they still seemed like my best friends...  
"So what if its only a week, Rose and...." CRASH! The sound of shattering glass. We all looked over to the kitchen where a large salad bowl had just gone falling to the ground.  
"Oh sorry." Cassie said. "I'm being such a klutz."  
"Need a hand?" Mogi asked.  
"Sure." The two of them started cleaning up the glass from the floor.  
"What was I talking about?" I asked still confused from the breaking dish.  
"Umm... Your friends I think." Ide offered  
"Oh yeah." I said regaining my thoughts. "I was telling you about the people I live with, their really cool..."  
"Never mind the mess, the foods ready." Cassie said brushing her clothing off hurriedly.  
"You want me to finish this?" Mogi asked.  
"No I think that we should eat." Cassie had moved back to the stove and was shoveling the food into wooden bowls.

Aizawa:  
"Damn it!" I said what was that woman doing she kept interrupting! "Mogi!" I yelled hoping that the reception to the ear pieces were working. "You need to get the woman out of the room." I instructed him.  
"Did you hear that?" Gevanni asked.  
"What?" I hadn't heard anything except the distorted voices from inside the house, which actually seemed to be coming in more clearly now that it was mentioned.  
"That sound I think it was on the roof." Are you kidding me? There was a banging sound. "See that sound." That was odd who the hell would be climbing on the van?! "Should we see what it was?" The other man asked. I nodded. We climbed out of the car taking a step back to see if we could spot anything which could have been making such a noise. Nothing . Figures.  
"Must be the wind." I said hoping that I was right, we didn't need anymore interference on this particular excursion.  
"Oh Yeah I guess."

Near:  
The reception on the screen went out.  
"What was that?" I asked looking up.  
"We seemed to have lost power on the camera." Rester said.  
"Gevanni?" I asked into the microphone.  
"Yes Near."  
"There seems to be something wrong with the camera."  
"The one on the top of the van?"  
"Yes, what other one could I be talking about?"  
"Sorry." He said quickly. "I think that the wind must have took it out, we'll get it back online a few moments."  
"Is that so? Would you be so kind as to fix it if your going to let it break?" I asked. Wind? It didn't even seem to be a windy day... Excuses...  
"The sound is working." Lidner said making sure that it was hooked up to speakers so that the whole room could hear now that it was back in working order, or at least thats what she claimed. "I just need to get to the right thing. Shit, #*!" A song suddenly blasted through the room, it was vaguely familiar, that horrible 80s one which had gained popularity recently because stupid people found the need to send it to one another, as someone had clearly done to her...  
"Lidner as much as we all really are enjoying your musical selection would you please turn it off." I said. What the hell is wrong with her today?!  
"I didn't do anything." She said almost in tears. "It just popped open, I swear I was trying to bring back the sound from the wire taps, nothing else!"  
"Then why are you not closing it?" I said leaning over to try and see what she was doing.  
"Because the thing moves." She said desperately clicking at what appeared to be random parts of the screen.  
"What?"  
"The window that the video is playing in, moves when you try to close it." Of course it did.  
"Gevanni can you at least hear whats going on?"  
"Yeah when we're in the van the reception is not so bad, but I'm gonna try to get the camera working."

Aizawa:  
"We have to get the equipment working." The other man said indicating the camera that was set up on the roof. I wonder what went wrong? It clearly wasn't the wind, but what the hell else could it be. "Can I have a hand?" Gevanni asked. I gave him a boost up onto the roof of the van.  
"Hows it look?" I asked.  
"I don't see anything." He said. "But I think that something is burning cause it smells like smoke." Great this is just what we need, the camera is not only broken its lite itself on fire!  
"I'm gonna go check whats happening inside." I climbed back into the car. GOD DAMN IT! All of the equipment had come unplugged in the mire moments we had been outside. Something really weird had to be happening, there just wasn't a rational explanation to found... The was a loud thud from outside I quickly looked out. Gevanni was lying on the ground. "What happened?" I asked.  
"I fell." He said sitting up. "I guess I must have slipped or something." He was rubbing his head.  
"Well we have to fix the equipment inside."  
"What happened?" He asked looking back to the roof as though considering something as he listened to me explain.  
"I don't know. I think that someone is trying to sabotage us." I said how the hell else could you explain all this? Though the real question was how..?

Matsuda:  
"Come on everyone sit down." Cassie said trying to herd us over to the table. I took my seat kind of confused. Cassie quickly was getting food ready, and putting all of the dishes out. She took her seat, before there were even plates out.  
"So nice area you live in." Mogi said. What was he talking about this place was really kind of gross, particularly the neighborhood?  
"Thank you." Cassie said also looking slightly taken aback.  
"Oh its just really nice. Could you show me around?" He asked looking at Cassie.  
"What?" She looked at me for some sort of indicator on what she should do, I shrugged.  
"Could you show me the area?"  
"I don't know if that is such a good idea." She said looking oddly nervous for such a simple request.  
"You should." I said, what harm would it do for the two of them to talk?  
"Yeah." Ide chimed it.  
"I guess." The woman said with a sigh. "I'll grab our coats." She stood up grabbing their stuff as the two of them left.  
"I think he likes her." I said.  
"Are you joking?" Ide said.  
"No they were so flirting the whole time." I said. "Come on." I moved over to the front window."  
"What are you doing?"  
"I'm watching them."  
"Why?"  
"Because..." But I didn't finish that thought because of the strangeness of what I saw outside the window. There was a black van parked out front which didn't really seem that odd I mean they had to have gotten here somehow, but Bob was sitting on top smoking a cigarette.  
"Whats wrong?" Ide asked joining me at the window.  
"Is that your car?" I asked.  
"Yeah." He nodded. Why was he even here? I thought that he was at the coast, but apparently not he was just sitting out there...On someone else car no less... I walked out the door. "Bob!" I yelled.  
"Oh shit." He said hopping down quickly.  
"Who are you talking to?" Ide asked.  
"I'm talking to Bob." I said indicating him as he was walking over to where I was standing.  
"I can explain." Bob said.

Aizawa:  
"Bob!" I heard Matsuda call. I looked out one of the windows. There didn't seem to be anyone else out there, yet he definitely seemed to think that someone was standing in front of him.  
"Whose he talking to?" Gevanni asked.  
"No idea." I watched as he indicated to nothing. "There isn't anyone there." All of a sudden the car started to roll. "Why are you driving?" I snapped looking to the man in the front seat who was looking around in total confusion.  
"I'm not." Gevanni said.  
"What do you mean?!"  
"I mean that I didn't do anything."  
"Then do something, STOP THE CAR!" I yelled.  
"Yeah just a sec." He quickly tried to get the car into park. "Its jammed." He said pulling at the parking break again.  
"Try the E break." The car came to a sudden stop and the passenger side door flew open then slammed shut. What the hell this better not be another messed up case like the last one! "I think that we need to get going." I said it seemed like the situation might turn dangerous. I quickly got out of the car.

Matsuda:  
"Aizawa?" I said as he walked over to join us. "What are you doing here?" I asked.  
"Who is Bob?" Ide asked. What was wrong with him Bob was standing right with us.  
"Bob!" I pointed to him.  
"Don't do that." Bob said calmly taking the cigarette out of his moth. "Just act like I'm not here and I'll explain later alright."  
"But why don't they see you?" I stared at him, there didn't seem to any reason that the other people around me couldn't see the younger man, yet they were all looking at me like I was insane.  
"I told you to stop talking to me, they are going to think that you snapped."  
"Matsuda who are you talking to?" It was Aizawa asking this time.  
"No one." I said trying to play along with Bob, not that I wanted to lie to my friends. That was not what I was most confused about, it was why they didn't seem to see Bob at all that I wasn't understanding. "But what are you doing here?"  
"Nothing!" He shot back running a hand angrily through his hair.  
"Get them to leave." Bob said equally as calm as before.  
"Okay." I nodded.  
"What?" Aizawa said.  
"Nothing." I said, I couldn't do this. "I think that you should go."  
"Yeah me too. Wheres Mogi?"  
"He left with Cassie."  
"Right I knew that." Aizawa said shaking his head.  
"Why did you know that?" I asked, was he listening in on me? but if so why? What could they possibly want to hear from that he couldn't have just come in and asked me!?  
"MOGI!" He yelled.  
"What?" He and Cassie had just walked over to us.  
"Oh..." Cassie said looking shocked.  
"Mogi lets get going."  
"Um okay." I watched as the three of them walked away.  
"Bye." I called after them feeling really confused and annoyed, what the hell was wrong with everyone, my coworkers from home and friends here... There was clearly so much that no one was telling me and or else why was everyone lying!? "What was that?" I asked.  
"Come on lets go inside." Cassie said leading us back into her house. Me and Bob sat down on the coach.  
"What happened?" Cassie asked looking at Bob. "All you were doing was..."  
"I know but..."  
"Wait!" I interjected. "Will you please explain, what is going on?" No sooner had I said that then the door flow open. The person who stamped in was a lean young man with shoulder length blond hair, the side of his face was marred with a burn scar, a rosary hit against his bare chest where the zipped vest had come opened slightly. The boy was familiar right off and by the looks on the two other occupants of the rooms faces he was certainly someone they knew...  
"MATT!" He yelled slamming the door as he fully entered the room.


	14. Chapter 14

I sat in my seat staring up at the boy that had just joined us, and even as I took in what I was seeing I was having a hard time believing it. Though I hadn't really ever seen him in person I knew his face automatically from a drawing I had seen many times. But that couldn't be right...What in the world was going on here!  
"Mello calm down." Bob said flicking cigarette ash into a cup on the coffee table.  
"Bob whats going on?" I asked, he didn't seem all that phased by the events around us, not that this was abnormal for him,still...  
"Who the hell is Bob?" Mello retorted scanning the room as though looking for someone, wasn't he just talking to Bob?  
"Thats would be me." He said with a smirk at the blond boy who screwed his face up in a scowl.  
"Why does he call you that?" Mello directed at Bob or Matt I think is what he called him a few moments ago.  
"It was a joke." Bob looked at me this time. "My name is actually Matt, well not really, but Matt works its what I've been called for the most part of my life."  
"But its not you real name either?" I clarified and he nodded.  
"No its not my name, just an alias I've always used." Matt said. "But I go by that so its okay, names aren't all that important to me." Not using a real name his whole life? Could he be another kid from Wammy's House, like Near and Mello had been? That would explain why he appeared to know Mello...  
"Alright." I nodded. Though no one was helping to make anything make sense...  
"Stop distracting me!" Mello yelled. "Matt what is wrong with you? You are such a moron!!" He stalked across the room to be closer to the other boy, apparently in order to glower over him to demonstrate his anger more throughly.  
"What are talking about?" Matt asked looking at the screen of his video game rather than at his ready to explode comrade.  
"What do you mean?! What the hell else would I be talking about?! You are such a moron sometimes Matt I swear..!!! You are aware you just blew our whole plan?" He managed to sputter through his anger, I had to admit he was scary angry though it didn't seem that Matt cared at all, clearly they must know each other well...A thought dawned on me, this was probably his roommate...Than another thought, he said that Matt had screwed up their whole plan...What kinda plan did they have and why?  
"Oh that...Right sorry about that, whatever I'm sorry man..."  
"What plan?!" I asked trying to get someones attention, but it didn't seem to be working, and to add to the distraction the door flew opened again and Rose ran in. Great now I was really never gonna be able to get an answer...  
"What are you doing here?! Aren't you supposed to be somewhere at the moment or are you and your boyfriend both to dumb to follow orders!" Mello shotted in her direction.  
"I came as soon as I heard." Rose said out of breath, also seeming to have an amazing ability to ignore the constant berating that she was receiving. "Thelma is trying to take care of damage control, I came back to check on how things are here." Mello stepped closer to her glaring bitterly.  
"You should have stayed." Mello said. "Your one job for the night was to monitor the people back at the hotel! Why do we even keep you around?!" He snapped very close to her face.  
"Hey!" Matt interrupter looking up for the first time since his roommate had come into the room. "I'm the one that messed up remember! She was doing fine!"  
"I know you were the one that messed up you blithering idiot, so don't think that I'm done with you! I just telling her to use her goddamn head for once!" He yelled, Matt stood up ready to lunge at the other boy before I interrupted. The last thing I need was a fist fight, than nothing would ever be cleared up!  
"Will someone tell me what is going on!!" I yelled. The room fell silent, the two boys stopping inches from each other. Mello looked confused staring back and forth from me to his friend. Rose laughed turning to her boyfriend, who looked at the ground. No one spoke for a few minutes. Matt sank back to the couch followed by Mello who seemed to have cooled down slightly since I had stopped them mid fight.

"You forgot to say please." Rose finally said with a smile. Mello let out a sigh burying his face in his hands.

"You mean he doesn't know? Really? I thought you were kidding Matt..." He muttered behind his hands. The brown haired boy ignored him looking over to me. He sucked in a breath.  
"Alright." He smiled at me. "Its really quit simple. We're dead." What? simple, they had to be joking! It wasn't very funny if you asked me, and what would be the point of lying like that right now!? Seriously did he have the ability to not make a joke in any situation... What the hell was really going on!  
"Dead?" I repeated, to see if I had heard him correctly, maybe he would explain more throughly or truthfully.  
"Thats right." Matt smirked as though this was a perfectly reasonable thing to have just told me, but it didn't make any sense. They all seemed to be so alive...  
"How?"  
"I was shot." Not really what I was asking, but that was interesting...I guess, but how could it be true? "We all died differently obviously; I was riddled with bullets by a bunch of psychos, Mello had a heart attack but I beat you know that, you were working on the case." The other boy scoffed, it was than I realized that I had never mentioned that I worked on the Kira case, though he did know I worked with chief Yagami, it was odd how much Matt appeared to know... "And Rose she fell out of a tree."  
"Danced." Rose corrected with a laugh.  
"What?" Matt looked at her.  
"I danced out of a tree."  
"No you were dancing and then you fell out of the tree." He rolled his eyes behind tinted sunglasses.

"Not true, I was dancing then danced off the limb of the tree I was on." She corrected. Even at times like this she could still get off topic, it amazed me. I must have looked confused because she explained. "You see I was tree sitting and we were getting kinda board so I was like, we should dance. Then everyone else seemed to think that you can't dance in a tree, so I showed them how I could do the macarena, which worked it was awesome. So then I got a bit cocky and tried to do the chicken dance and you know the part where you doosey doe? Yeah can't do that in a tree. So... I died." I was dumbfounded, even if they were dead what kind of way to go was that. Though it was somehow perfectly suiting for someone as strange as Rose...  
"I know that its hard to believe." Matt said reaching forward to touch my hands which I was resting on the table stupidly, this was all a little to much... He smiled at me in a reassuring way, it was so odd to think that this person I had come to know wasn't alive...  
"Knowing me I don't think its that surprising." Rose said, a joke as always, I had come to realize she didn't like serious topics of converstation.  
"Not that." He said. "I meant that we're dead." Which everyone had known he meant, her face feel turning away from us.  
"Oh." She said simply.  
"But think about it man, your a cop you must at least have some idea how the wittiness protection program works." I nodded that had always seemed weird, it wasn't the way that it work, and I knew that. But I just convinced myself otherwise to make sense of what was happening around me... I realied that now... "And you were there when Mr. Yagami died." He was dead too... Somehow I had not put those together. I suddenly felt sad all over again, in a way it felt like having to watch someone die all over again.... They were right though I had been there, I had seen what had happened and it was only wishful thinking that I had even believed them in the first place.  
"So all of you?" Could they really mean all of them? Pearl she was so little... and Lisa... and Cassie, other people talked to her there was no way that she could be. "What about you?" She shock her head.  
"I'm alive." Cassie said stepping forward. "I'm like you."  
"How?" Like what, what was it that made us see them when obviously no one else could...  
"We both see ghost." She said. Ghost, wow when you put it like that its even stranger. "But aside from me all the rest are dead." I nodded. In some ways it was so sad, they were mostly young which made it even more terrible to think they had all died...  
"Why can I see you all then?" I asked not knowing what else to say, it was as logical a question as I could come up with.  
"I think that it is random." Cassie said. "To some extent, it has to be triggered though, I think by something tragic at least thats my best guess. For me it was when I was very young and my father died in the war." She smiled at me.

"And for you." Matt took over. "It was all the business with the Kira case." I nodded. I was having trouble believing anything that they were saying, how could it be true? But the more I thought about it the more sense it made. My friends had been unable to see Matt at all when he was standing right next to them, and after meeting Shinigamis who was I to really be skeptical of this type of thing.

"Okay." I said trying to take it all in. "So why didn't you tell me?" He shrugged picking up the video game again and staring back at the screen.

"I didn't want to scare you." Yeah cause finding out like this is so much better, wouldn't it have been easier to have found all this out before I had gotten to know everyone?

"So then what were you all doing, you said that you guys were at the beach? Clearly that was a lie." I said, he laughed not looking up.

"Oh that." Matt said. "You see it all has to do with the robberies."

"At the Art Museum?" I asked, how on earth did lying to me and all that have to do with art theft!?

"Thats right."

"But we know who did that."

"Yes we know, but the problem is that the people who are doing it are also dead." I nodded that made sense. "So its not like we can just turn them in or anything, and then to make things even worse they caught you in tape at the museum. So you my friend are prime suspect number one."

"No." I said, but of course... "They all know me..." Though that seemed to make sense, why else would they have wanted to come over so bad? They all thought that I was running some underground theft thing? So much for friendship hm?

"Yeah your friends didn't want to believe it, but there not the ones in charge of the investigation..."

"Near is." Mello interjected.

"Thats right." Matt continued. "Mello has been trying to help Near figure it out, that was he was back in England."

"I figure," Mello said "that all I had to do was make myself obvious to alert him to the presence of ghost. Unfortunately he seems to be much dumber then I would have thought I always knew it was true, so there has been no luck on that front. He still has no idea whats going on, so in his book you are the only person that could have done it, since you were on tape in the museum"

"So..." Rose said. "We could have taken care of it with out any living people, but we messed up by bringing you with us. So we need to have the investigators believe in ghost, how hard could that be?" Clearly she didn't know what hot heads they could be, though like me they had all been involved in the Kira case which had dealt a lot with the supernatural, so why would this be much different? I could just hope that in the end they would believe that there were ghost involved...

"Just a question," I said thinking about something. "Why are you all involved in the case at all?"

"Well..." Matt thought. "Want to go to Buncom?"

Near:

What had happened?

I had set the scene up using action figures and was laying in the middle of it. Something was missing, none of this made any sense without it. Bob, I thought, who was this Bob and why was everybody unable to see him? I had heard the different accounts over and over yet there was no way that all these things could have happened...

"Gevanni?" I said turning to the dark haired man who was sitting on the ground next to me.

"What?" He looked over at me, he still appeared to be shaken from the whole event.

"Tell me again how long were you out of the car when everything got unplugged?" I asked him, he scrubbed a hand over his face looking up at the ceiling as he thought to make sure that he got it right.

"I was out a little longer, but I think that Aizawa was back in there after about five minutes tops."

"Hhhmm. is that correct?"

"Yeah that sounds about right?" Aizawa said sitting down near me. "It wasn't long enough and the doors were locked except the one that I used and no one got past me."

"Thank you for you reassurance , but clearly either someone or something got past you." I clearly I rolled my eyes.

"Yes that does seem to be the case." He said sounding annoyed.

"I think that we are going to need to know more about this Bob person." I said. "Because I think that we might just have found our second person at the museum."


	15. Chapter 15

**So this chapter is a little early, yah. So this chapter is just from Aizawas prospective for something a little different. I hope that you all enjoy.**

Aizawa:  
I was only just asleep, well I guess technically I was still awake. We had went over everything, to the point that it was decided the only thing to do was get some sleep which was something for Near as he didn't give up easily. Sleep...Yeah like that was really going to happen after all of that. To make matters even worse I had drawn the short end of the stick and ended up sleeping on the floor. It was going to be a long night... I started going through the events again in my mind. I really didn't understand how Near could be so calm about this... and what is that annoying sound?! Someone was walking around, must be getting water or something, I thought. I tried to keep my eyes closed all that opening them would do was delay sleep even more then before and that was not what I need.

Then out of nowhere something fell on me.  
"Shit!" Lidner yelled after landing face down on the floor apparently tripping over me. "Sorry." She said in a quite voice looking around to make sure that she hadn't woken anyone else up.  
"What are you doing awake?" I snarled impatiently, and why the hell was she wandering around in the dark!  
"Don't you hear that sound?" She asked looking at me like I was insane. I looked around the room confused, all the other occupants were sleeping; Near was on one bed apparently having drifted off mid playing with toys, Rester was on the other.  
"What are you talking about?" I asked perking up to try to hear anything at all other than breathing, nothing, what was she going on about anyways..?  
"That sound you seriously don't hear that sound?!" She whispered in a yelling fashion, waving her hands around as she spoke.  
"No I don't." I wish she would just go back to sleep.  
"You didn't even listen." She said.  
"Fine." Its not like I had spent the last who knows how long trying to sleep and listening to the silent room. So I listened, nothing, nothing, aaahhhhh. I heard the sound of a girl screaming, but they sounded close! How could I have missed them before?  
"You hear it right?" The woman's voice brought me back from my thoughts.  
"Yeah." I nodded hurriedly, there was someone screaming we had to find out who!  
"The screaming is moving further away." She said. "I think that someone might be in trouble."  
"We should follow it." I said. Not that I could do much, not being a cop in this country, but still the girl sounded young its not like we could have done nothing.  
"Yeah." Lidner agreed. I grabbed my jacket and gun before heading out the door, there was no time to change. Before the two of us headed out in to the night. The screams were definitely moving they had to be at least a floor down by now. Why was no one else doing anything? We ran down the hall at full speed only to reach the next floor and hear that they were still on the move. Even as we reached the lobby.  
"Where could they have gone?" I asked turning to the girl.  
"I don't know." She looked around confused. "Maybe its further away then it sounds." I nodded that had to be the case. "We should get the car." She offered with a shrug.  
"Good idea." The car was parked near the front of the building in a pay to park spot. We got in quickly not wanting to lose the sound of screaming which was moving but still loud enough to hear. We listened carefully as we drove trying to make sure that we were still heading the same direction. As we drove the distance seemed to stay the same no matter what speed we were driving, odd what was this person moving in? I could feel myself starting to panic, when I heard Lidner quietly laughing. What the hell was wrong with her? This is someones life who could be in danger and she was laughing?

"What?" I barked.  
"Nothing." She was trying to hide whatever it was.  
"Do you not understand the severity of the situation?" She nodded frantically.  
"I do seriously I do..." She was cut off again by a fit of laughing.  
"Stop that!" I yelled she was making it hard to hear, but just as I thought that the screams grew louder. We were finally gaining on them!  
"I'm sorry." She said pulling herself together, only to lose it again.  
"What could possibly be so funny?" I asked fearful to hear the answer.  
"Its just..." Laughing.  
"Its what?!"  
"Its... Its like a cop show." Are you serious? I was trying to catch a criminal and the person who was going to be my back up was laughing because it was like a cop show... "I know its not even funny." She laughed. "But I haven't done the whole go catch the bad guy thing." She was still having trouble talking.  
"Aren't you a cop?"  
"No." She shock her head. "I used to work for the CIA, so I never got to do this whole chase down, thing." I had to laugh, I had been in a room of cops and had possibly brought the person with the least training for the situation at hand.  
"Do you even no how to handle this type of thing?" I asked. She nodded pulling herself together finally. "Yeah, I do have some training, all I was saying was that was kind of like a car chase which is cool." Of course it is. I stopped the car as I reached a parking lot that was completely empty. A sigh read Cathedral Park. I looked around, the park was under a bridge, but was filled with a wide open field.  
"We must have made a wrong turn." I said. "Damn it!"  
"No." Lidner said opening the door. "Don't you hear it, its coming from over here." I followed her into the middle of the field. It was wishful thinking if she really thought that we were going to find anything. Yet I really could still hear it. "No, this way." She was walking to a area that was less clear, there were some bushes as we got closer the sound got louder and louder. Yeah the girl had to be in those bushes. I shuddered to think about it...  
"Stop right there!" I yelled, as we sped up to reach her. Just as we reached the bushes the sound stopped. Shit I hope were not to late. Lidner was in there before me climbing around.  
"I don't see anyone!" She called out. What that was impossible!  
"Are you sure?" She was clearly just not looking hard enough.  
"Its a patch of bushes how many places could someone be hiding!" I sighed.  
"Let me see." I climbed in to the brambles trying to prove her wrong. Of course we were wearing perfect outfits for climbing through thorns, without shoes on and pajamas I wasn't fairing my best. I could only imagine how Lidner was doing, she hadn't been wearing much only a tank top and shorts..Not that I'd looked... "Theres no one here." I said.  
"No theres not." Lidner agreed, but how could that be? Just moments before there was screaming within feet of us!? We walked back to the car in silence with nothing to show for our efforts except for scratches up our arms and legs from the thorny bushes. When we got to the car we took our same seats, but didn't start the car or even do anything. I had no idea what to say. If early today had been scary I had no words for what I was feeling now, or what I figure both of us were feeling. I looked over at the woman next to me who looked close to tears.

"Drive the car." She said in a quite voice. I nodded still unable to form real words. I ran my hand through my hair. What had happened? Were we looking in the wrong place? Maybe the girl was a block away or something, we had to call the police. I took my phone out of my pocket and handed it to Lidner.  
"Police." I managed to say. She dialed the number still staring vacantly forward as I made my way back to the hotel.  
"Hello." I heard her say still in a small voice. "Yes we heard screaming, and we think that someone might be in danger." She was nodding as the person on the other end talked. "Yes, it was at Cathedral Park." She looked at me to make sure, I nodded. "Your welcome." hanging it up, but somehow looking less shaken. I guess it must have been knowing that someone was going to help.  
"You left out the disappearing." I said trying to crack a joke, something that I sucked at even in the most normal of situations, so was a complete failure at in one like this. Still she laughed.  
"I know, that really would have helped." She smiled and unbuckled her seat belt before climbing into the space between our two seats and into the back.  
"What in the world are you doing?" I asked craning to look at her in the rear view mirror.  
"I had a thought." She had pulled out one of the laptops that we kept in the car in case of emergencies.  
"And what was that?"  
"I'm looking something up." She said climbing back into her seat next to me and propping the laptop on her bare knees.  
"What?" I looked over as she typed _Cathedral park screams_ and pressed entered. "What good it that going to do?" I asked trying to watch the road while still seeing what came up on the screen.  
"Well when I first was looking, you know right after the screaming stopped I had the strangest thought, out of nowhere, like someone said it, to try looking something up, but then I thought that I was just crazy." I nodded, that sounded crazy to me, so what was the point of this? "So, then when I was on the phone and said where we were the lady had this like _oh_ sound like that was normal or something, so I thought there must be something..." She stopped staring at the back lite writing on the screen in front of her which was blanching her already pale features.  
"What is it?" I asked she looked..Nervous maybe?  
"Pull over!" She said grabbing my arm. "You need to look at this!" This had better be good. I pulled the car to the side of the road.  
"What is it?" She turned the screen to face me. The web site was purple with bright blue lettering and a picture of the park. "What is this?" Lidner turned it back, to skim again.  
"Well the first link was just about the park, but the second one found me this. Your not going to believe this, but it says that Cathedral Park is haunted by the ghost of a girl named Thelma Taylor, it says that she died in 1949 when she was 15 years old, it talks about her death, apparently she was abducted and left for dead."  
"Yeah the place has a ghost story." I said trying to make my voice not sound shaky theres no way that I would think that we were lead somewhere by a ghost...That would just be to weird...  
"It says that she is heard screaming. A young girl screaming." I could hear a strange mix of terror and excitement in her voice even as she said the words, the exact same feelings I was having at the moment... "A ghost we just had an encounter with a ghost... Oh my god."  
"No we didn't." I said, theres no way, this just couldn't be another case like that...  
"Yes we did and you know that we did!" Well stranger things have happened. "Oh my god." She said quieter. "Its all ghost." She whispered.  
"What is all ghost?"  
"Everything, everything thats been happening its ghost!" She said excitedly jumping up in her seat to face me. She was going insane, great just what I needed... "Think about it, none of the computers work." I nodded, I guess that was common in ghost stories and she said like it meant something to ghost legends. "Things move when we don't touch them, right?" True. "Things become mysteriously unplugged." There had to be another reason for all of this... "And your friend with that Bob guy? What if Bob was a ghost?" She finished. I had no answer. Silence. That was all I could think of..."Please say something I feel a little crazy at the moment." She smiled it must have been obvious by the look on my face that I was not thinking she had lost her mind anymore...  
"Holy shit." I said. "We're being haunted."

"We're being haunted." She repeated. "Aizawa..." She stopped. "Hey what is your name?" She asked cocking her head as she looked at me.

"Aizawa." I said obviously she had just said it.

"I mean your first name." Light blue eyes rolled and she shock her head as though this was obvious, but I guess in America people more commonly called each other by first name she it probably was to her...

"Oh Shuichi." I said. "And you?"

"Halle." She said. "But anyways Shuichi, I totally blame you for this." She smiled clipping the computer closed and placing on the floor at her feet.

"Blame me for what Halle?" I asked confused, she was an odd one but at least she had a sense of humor which was more than the other SPK member I had worked with seemed to have.

"Every time we work with you its some kind of weird supernatural thing." She laughed. "Thats not so bad though, having all worked on this kind of thing."

"How do you figure that?" I asked.

"Well at least it will make it easier to convince them." She laughed, true at least we'd all worked on a case with death gods involved so we knew that no one would be able to call us crazy for thinking ghosts.

"Good point." I said as I started up the car and headed back to the hotel.


	16. Chapter 16

I had managed to fall asleep for a limited amount of time, apparently this trip was very long. I was in the back sitting with Rose who was in the middle and Matt on the other side, Mello was sitting up front in the passenger seat and Cassie was, as always, driving. It was getting late and there were no other cars on the highway so Cassie had let Matt open the window to smoke, Rose was sleeping leaning against him. A cell phone range.

"Hey there." Mello said lifting his cell up to his ear. "Matt close the window!" He yelled. "I can't hear any thing."

"Whatever." Matt said rolling it up complacently."So what happened?"

"Why are you yelling?" Rose asked wiping the sleep out of her eyes.

"Shut up I'm trying to talk on the phone." The boy in the front said pointedly. "Really?" He laughed into the phone. "He always was slow."

"What happened?" Matt asked annoyed that he was being completely ignored..

"Ok." Mello said quickly waving a hand at the other boy to stop speaking. "That is why I love you. Bye." He clicked his cellphone closed.

"What happened?" Matt repeated ignoring that gesture.

"Wait a minute." Mello snarled. "That was Thelma."

"I kinda figured that from the I love you." Matt said.

"If you want to know what happened then stop interrupting me!" He snapped.

"Fine." Matt shrugged apparently losing interesting what his roommate was saying.

"Good. What I was trying to say was that I was talking to Thelma and she said that she had managed to convince two investigators that ghost are real and behind the crimes."

"Wow." Rose said clapping her hands in excitement.

"How?" Matt asked.

"She screamed." He told them in a matter of fact way. How would that help?

"Shes a well known local legend." Rose said. "I wish that I was a local legend but my powers just aren't that cool. Sucky hm?" Powers? I scrunched my face up which she appeared to think was funny.

"All ghost have a power." Matt explained. "It differs from person to person depending on how they died. Thelma died a violent death so she can scream. Were as other people do things that reflect what happened to them." I nodded, in someway that made sense.

"Thats where ghost stories come from." Rose said. "Like Addy, Pearl's friend you met, is seen crying through windows or in the parking lot at the Edgefield all the time." Oh how odd, though it did seem like there had to be some pieces of truth in ghosts stories with so many ghosts running around, so sometimes they could be heard?

"Can I finish what I was saying?!" Mello interjected looking annoyed.

"What else was there?" Matt rolled his eyes looking back to the screen he was playing on. "Near figured it out. Like Near always figures it..."

"Not Near." Mello said smirking, clearly this made him very happy for some reason.

"Then who?" Matt looked confused, was it so unbelievable that someone other than Near could put the pieces together?

"Aizawa and Linder." I smiled. He must be proud of himself.

"Wait the chick that me and Thelma have been messing withs computer?" Rose asked. Mello nodded. She laughed. "She was fun to annoy."

"Why were you annoying her?" I asked confused.

"It was part of trying to help them figure it out." Rose said. I nodded that made sense, eventually they would have had to think something supernatural... The car pulled off the highway.

"We're almost there." Cassie said looking back at us. The town that we pulled up to was small, barely a town really, there only appeared to be three buildings which were all terribly run down and looked as though they hadn't been lived in for at least a hundred years.

"You know people who live here?" I asked, but everyone did always seem to be going to Buncom clearly there was a lot going on... It didn't look that way to me...

"They call them ghost towns for a reason." Rose laughing at her own joke.

"That was terrible." Matt said. I was about to open the door when something slammed into it.

"Stop!" A woman's voice yelled. "Put your hands on the car and don't move." Matt opened the door on his side hoping out.  
"Are you sure that we are supposed to get out." I asked. This doesn't seem like the kind of situation that civilians should be joining, clearly this woman was in the middle of capturing the man she had pinned to the hood of our car. Of course even as I thought this I realized I was the only one left in the car.  
"Don't worry its safe." Matt said. I climbed out getting a better look at the scene that was going on around us. There was a dark haired man face down on the car, the woman who also had dark hair which was pulled back in a ponytail.  
"Whats going on?" I asked directing my question at Matt and Rose.  
"This is what happens when the insane go insane." The woman said, she looked so familiar. I had definitely seen her somewhere, I just couldn't place it...  
"So is this the guy that's been attacking the cars?" Rose asked. Mello rolled his eyes.  
"Yes it is." The other woman said. "We've locked him up several times but he keeps sneaking away. Sorry about that." Wait ghost get locked up? But by who, was there police somewhere?  
"Are they also ghost?" I asked they could clearly see the others but...  
"Yes we are." She said.  
"Then... Well whats going on?" I asked.  
"We are a group that is working to break down on ghost who are committing crimes. Mainly crimes against humans that are defenseless to stop them." She said locking the mans hands in a pair of handcuffs. She must be one of the people that Chief Yagami was working for, but what was Misa doing here if thats what happened in this city? That didn't seem like her type of thing, though she had been very eager to get here when she arrived... "By the way my name is Naomi." She said. Naomi, thats it she had been killed during the Kira investigation, I had only seen her in pictures but this was definitely her!  
"My name is Touta." I said offering a hand, only to realize that she was holding down a criminal.  
"So what brings all of you down here?" Naomi asked.  
"Well they messed up on our plan." Mello said gesturing to all of us. "But don't worry Thelma helped to fix it or at least get the investigation to be leading in the right direction."  
"Great they'll be really happy to hear that." Naomi smiled. "Would you mind giving me a hand?" She asked our general group, as Mello's phone range again.  
"Hey there, whats up?" He said stepping away from the group.  
"We can help." Rose offered.  
"Nice. We had a few get out so I'm on my own." She explained flipping her hair over the shoulder of her leather jacket.  
"That sucks." Matt said. "What happened?"  
"We need to find somewhere bigger to keep them. Two of them seem to have a way of escaping and when one gets out they all do." She sighed. She moved the man away from the car, I recognized him right away.

Teru Mikami. I shuddered.  
"I know you." He said looking me over in the twitchy and manic fashion had spoken to us while at the warehouse.  
"Don't talk." Naomi said. We walked with her over to one of the three buildings, this one was the biggest a bunk house type thing. "The keys are in my pocket could one of you grab them and open the door."  
"Sure thing." Rose said doing as she was told. The door reveled the inside that had several beds in it.  
"Stay in there." Naomi said as he reluctantly was led in. She locked the door.  
"Hey!" Mello yelled. "The investigators are on there way."

Aizawa:  
"Shhh." Lidner said as I opened the door.  
"What?" I turned to her.  
"We don't want to wake everyone up." I nodded, that made sense.  
"There you are." Gevanni said looking up. He was sitting with Rester and Near. The lights were all on. I guess they had already noticed that we were gone...  
"Hey." Lidner waved.  
"Where were you?" The man asked with a smirk.  
"Perv." She retorted. Oh god I had not even thought that they would think that...Damn I would never hear this end of this from my men...  
"Its not like that." I said.  
"Mr. Aizawa I have no interest in your late night liaisons." Near said, he could be so infuriating.  
"We have something that we need to tell you." Lidner said. The door between the two rooms flew open and Ide and Mogi ran in.  
"Did you hear that sound?" Ide asked.  
"Was it screaming?" Halle asked, that would be strange if the ghost was still here?  
"No." Mogi said looking confused.  
"It sounded like running." Ide said. "It was outside in the hall." We all stopped to listen. There was definitely someone running. What was so odd about that? "But when we looked out there was no one there." Oh great not this again. The running was joined by a second sound, gun shoots. Me and all the other agents ran out into the hall. Nothing. But unlike last time the sound stopped.  
"Is there anyone there?" Near yelled from inside the room.  
"No it was a ghost!" Lidner called back, not how I would have told them, and looking at everyone else it did not look like they were buying it. Other guests were looking out of their doors now... Could it really have been more ghost? My answer came fast in the form of a small hand that I felt take hold of mine. I looked down to see nothing there. A cold shiver shoot through my body. My hand was squeezed tightly, I returned the gesture. Then I felt a pull as the ghost pulled me towards not the room that I had just left but the one that Mogi and Ide had been in. I followed letting it lead me.

"Um where are you going?" Ide asked turning to watch me as I continued allowing the small ghost to pull me.

"I don't know, your room follow me." Sure that sounded reasonable, I walked in through the door. The room had a map of Oregon laid across the bed with a course marked out in red marker.  
"What were you guys doing?" I asked looking at the stuff, planning an escape route by the look of it, to somewhere in eastern Oregon...  
"What do you mean?" Ide asked joining us. "We didn't do that." He was eying it with the same confusion as I was... All of us were gathering around. My hand was released but I could still feel a cold small presence next to me, had it lead me here on purpose, maybe ghosts had done this as well...  
"Whats in Buncom?" Gevanni asked. I've never even heard of the place, clearly it was important enough that they had showed it to us. Rester had joined us in the room last with Near.  
"Buncom?" Near repeated. "What were the two of up to?"  
"Like I said." Ide said. "We didn't do this."  
"It was ghost." Lidner repeated. Why did she have to put it like that, it made her sound crazy, but of course in true Near fashion...  
"Ghost." Near repeated. "Yes that makes sense." He nodded to the group as a whole. "Lets go to Buncom."

Matsuda:

"What do you mean heading here?" Matt asked.

"I mean what I said." Mello said melodramatically. "Everyone is leading the investigators here."

"Everyone?" I asked.

"Yeah all of the people from back at the apartment." The boy said. "They're using a similar concept to the one that Thelma used, but instead of trying to make them figure it out they are simply trying to lead them here." Clever I thought. "They even have Gary helping."

"Why?" Rose asked tilting her head.

"You know what he can do right?" Matt said. Me and Rose shook our heads. "Running followed by gunshots."

"Why?" I asked.

"He died back in Vietnam." Cassie said. "His platoon was gunned down." Oh, I nodded again it was all rather odd considering that I had never thought of the fact that they were ghosts.

"But how could that help?" I asked feeling confused.

"Just a diversion." Mello said. "It gave the time for Shingo to make a map. Then Pearl led them back into the room." Wow that was kinda cool, without really being able to comunicate they managed to get information across.

"How did Pearl lead them?" They couldn't see her could they?

"She can take hands." Matt said. Creepy, I had held the young girls hand many times, but I think that it would have been really scary if I hadn't seen her standing next to me, sounded like something out of a ghost story people told at slumber parties.

"Matsu!" Misa had run out of the the middle sized building where she was apparently staying at the moment.

"I have to run and finish finding everyone." Naomi said.

"I'll help." Cassie offered.

"Thanks." Naomi said. Waving they walked away back towards the direction Naomi had come running from.

"Not helping?" Rose asked Misa who was now standing with our group, the other blond shook her head unhappily.

"No Misa was told shes not allowed to help ever." She said in a huff.

"Why not?" I asked.

"Misa was told that her help was not helpful, and she had to go back to her room." I laughed, that sounded like what Misa was normally doing, though she did have her moments of helping a lot of the time she just got in the way...Terrible as that sounded.

"Is everyone else in the post office?" Mello asked. She made a thinking face.

"Um well you just saw Naomi and Ray, thats her boyfriend." She said in a matter of fact way. "Oh yeah and Mr. Yagami they're all looking for the escaped convict ghosts. Besides that I think... That... Yeah they're in post office." She nodded her head towards a building that looked like it was straight out of an old western movie, really the whole town felt that way...

"Okay lets go." Mello said.  
"They don't want to talk to anyone, they're working." She put extra emphasis on the word working as she whinned about whoever it was that she had been with up until we arrived...  
"I think they'll talk to me." The blond boy said waving her off as he stalked in that direction. "But um Rose maybe you should wait out here." He gave her a smile.  
"Its funny cause its true." Rose laughed. "They really do hate me. Maybe I should go help with the gathering people thing." Matt nodded his agreement.  
"That might be a good idea." He said.  
"Misa can help find the rest of the people!" Misa offered smiling at the other girl, who she hadn't really gotten off on the right foot with.  
"Alright sure." Rose said. "Off to go round them up." She said and the two girls walked off together.  
"Come on lets go!" Mello said pulling our attention back to him as he seemed to do frequently.  
"Right." Matt said nodding. We followed him in to the old building. The room was filled with computers, which was interesting considering how it had looked on the ourside, but that seemed to be the case with buildings which ghosts occupied. My eyes scanned that room farther to the people who were working. There sitting in a chair was L and next to him Light both staring intently at the screens...


	17. Chapter 17

I stared blankly at the two men sitting in the room in front of me. Somehow even though I had met so many people that I had known my mind had never gone to the fact that I could have seen them... Most of all Light, I had been the one to shoot him... Everyone tried to tell me that I hadn't been the one to kill him (though they had also said that it wasn't a bad thing to have done), and no matter what I still seemed to blame myself for his death. What was he doing here?! Why would he want to be helping L? Weren't they rivals..?  
"I'm sure that you are very confused at the moment Matsuda." L said not looking up from a piece of cake he was eating.  
"Well yeah." I said. "I know some stuff about what your doing but..."  
"Yes I had figured as much, one of them would have filled you in. The only thing is how much do you know?"  
"I know that you are part of some kind of organization to stop ghost crimes." I said trying to bring my thoughts back to what we were talking about and not the shock of speaking to someone who I knew had been dead for over six years...  
"Yes that is correct." He tilted his head slightly to look at me without turning. "But you have something else that you want to know about?" I nodded. "By all means ask." He offered. I pointed to Light, who looked over.  
"What is he doing here?" Light smiled, but L was the one to answer.  
"Yes well about that, it really does relate to the question of what are we doing here. Upon discovering that there was no punishment in the after life I was quick to try and create some kind of my own. I gathered people who I knew, that were of a like mind to me on the matter, and we started to help install groups like this all over the world, well I of course continued my work on the Kira case. Once dead there was no question on who had done it, so I took a back seat giving space for Near and Mello to finish it, and I would step in once Kira or Light was dead. I was there when it happened, unwilling to let him escape. I was unsure of what to do with him though. It was unfitting to simply lock him up like the rest of the criminals. That is why I choose to lock him to myself. Though this is not the most pleasant solution for me it is a sacrifice that I'm willing to make. Back to why he is working with me, Light for all of his bad qualities does still possess a strong sense of justice, given this and his intelligence and deductive skills it seemed that there would be no problem in letting him work along side me, after all he was going to be stuck there anyway." I nodded I guess that made sense or as much sense as anything that L said ever did, I always had trouble following it seemed he always circles to make a point...  
"L!" Mello yelled. "Hey is this really important right now?"  
"Yes I think that it is when I first choose to work with Light, were you not against it?"  
"Yeah I was! The man is a murderer!" The blond snapped viciously.  
"Well actually I was..." Light started.  
"No Light." L stopped him. "You were a murderer and we are not going to be spending time debating that fact. What you did was wrong and that is why you are not allowed to leave."  
"Thats such a lame punishment." Mello said rolling his eyes. "The guy doesn't deserve to be able to do anything!"  
"If it helps hes not allowed to eat cake." L offered. Matt laughed next to me, as Mello just fumed. "I'm glad that we settled that, but what I was trying to say is that Mello and everyone else was given the information and entitled to their own opinions..."  
"Not that you listen." Mello inserted with annoyance, huffing as he slumped against a wall.  
"Generally that is true that I don't care for the opinions of others, I was simply stating that your allowed to have one not that I would be taking any action based on what that opinion was, but please allow me to finish what I'm trying to say. Which basically is that everyone, even Mastuda, deserves an explanation." I was not really sure what that even meant, but figured that it was most likely a low blow at me, but unlike Mello I chose to ignore it. I had come to realize long ago that this was just the way which L spoke, and letting it get to you would just get you in trouble... "Now is there anything else that you need to know?" I shook my head nothing that I could think of at the moment. "Alright Mello did you have something that you wanted to say."  
"Yes as a matter of fact I did." The younger boy snarled.  
"Then by all means do say, its not like anyone is stopping you." He said giving the younger boy half smile before turning back to the computer screen.  
"Fine I will! The investigation team is on their way."  
"Great so they should be here by morning?"  
"Probably earlier, they're being given driving assistance I believe." Mello said with a smile which made me think that he was saying something evil with those words.  
"Good."  
"Wait I do have a question." I said feeling kind of dumb that I hadn't thought of it before.  
"Of course you do." L said. "Well then, yes what is it?"  
"So its kinda odd but, you can all move things and touch people and write, I've seen everyone do it so why are these like power things needed?" I finished. "Does that make sense what I'm asking?"  
"Yes I understand, that is a reasonable question. I have had little to no interaction with mediums, such as yourself, so I may not be an expert on the subject, so if anyone has any additional knowledge they may feel free to step in." Everyone nodded. "Ghost are, as is well know through stories, merely shades and do not have a true form. However we have one that we our selves and other ghosts can see, and can use at will, to pick things up as you said, and touch each other, mediums fall into the same realm as other ghost in the interaction that we may have with them, so we can touch you, but if I tried to do the same to a living person I would go through them, this is not to say that we can go through walls and other solid object, this is simply a built in mechanism to keep our lives separate from that of living humans."

"So if you can pick things up, why not just write?" I asked.  
"I figured that you were going to be asking that next. Communication between us and them is very difficult, that is why electronics like phones and computers don't tend to work when a ghost is near by." He said as if it was common knowledge, like everything he knew. "Like wise when we write it is readable to me and other ghost and even to you but to other living humans it looks like scribbles."  
"Like at seyonces." Light added. What? I don't really know anything about those... I cocked my head confused. "At a seyonces the person who is communicating with the dead will commonly scribble on a piece of paper then say that there is a massage from a ghost even though in most cases this is just a hoax, it is sometimes real and its true that only the medium can read the writing, in fact to them it looks perfectly clear and can lead to confusion that the rest of the room can't read it. Like for instance if you were reading, no one else could."  
"So that is why most communications are literally impossible. Though our ability to communicate with the living is enhanced in the dark." L said putting his now empty plate down. "There are some exceptions who are able to write, even in a lit room."  
"Like Shingo." Matt said throwing in a comment for the first time in a while.  
"Like in his case, this can show up in ghosts as...Well for lack of a better word their power, not that we are positive on why it would be his power saying as he died of a heart attack we can only assume that he must have been writing when it happened." Heart attack? He seem young I wonder if he was killed by Kira? He didn't seem like such a bad person, if anything maybe a little portentous but I don't think that anyone was punished for that...  
"Heart attack victims get random powers." Matt said. "Like Reiji can control people kind of."  
"Kind of?" I asked. He died of a heart attack too? That was really weird...And some of random that they lived together...  
"Yes kind of." L said. "Minor motions like turning a hand, or moving a foot. That is what allows him to assist in there driving he can force someone to speed, by making them push their foot on the gas peddle."

"What I think." Light said. "Is that if there was nothing interesting about their deaths, it draws from personality traits and ambitions. Reiji for example was a business man and therefore wanted power and control, something that his power allows him."  
"You know him also?" I asked, though I guess they are all dead they must all know each other, I hadn't really meant to ask that out loud... Light and L both gave me the same strange look, one I was familiar with, what I had said that was really wrong now?  
"Yeah Matsuda. I met him again dead, but its not like I had never had an interaction with him before." Light told me with a smile, as though telling a very stupid child something that they thought was really obvious, I was still confused. "I was the one who killed him and Shingo as well actually." What?! How could he talk about killing like that! like it was nothing! And why were they looking at me condescendingly, um more condescendingly than usual that is...  
"You really have no idea do you?" L asked flatly.  
"Of what?" I asked, if Light had killed them they must have had something to do with the Kira case, but what..?  
"And you were the one who met them face to face." Light said. "But its you, so this doesn't really surprise me."  
"Hey!" Why did they always have to be so insulting?  
"I'm sorry but it really was deserved." He gave me a second to think, but still I couldn't come up with how I could have known them when they were living... "Reiji Namikawa and Shingo Mido they both worked for the Yotsuba group." Oh yeah! Wow...I had totally not connected those two people with the people who lived in my apartment building, the names were the same, but still I was pretty far from Japan to assume, a little far to assume I knew them... That was kind of sad, but I had only met them once like six years ago in a totally different setting and thought they were dead...I think that it makes sense that I didn't think of that, even if I had they were dead! I would have made myself think something else for sure, cause what reason would I have for thinking I was talking to two dead people... Yet still I could feel my face turning red from embarrassment.  
"Its ok." Matt said trying to comfort me.  
"I know. I'm kinda used to them its just been awhile." I said as a loud screeching of breaks was heard outside make all of us turn to see what had happened.

Near:

I was sitting in the back of the mini van, not that I was pleased with this arrangement. I had wanted to sit in the front, but on account of being the smallest of all of us I was not only made sit in the back, but the middle between Lidner and Gevanni. Aizawa and Ide were in the middle, Rester was driving and Mogi was next to him. It was not hard for me to except that everything that was happening was ghost, in fact it really made everything that had happened to me make a lot more sense, everything that had been happening... I kept thinking of when I had been leaving to the United States in the car, the person had written my name and a cross... Though there was not anyone who knew my real name, it did seem possible that this piece of knowledge was acquired postmortem of course it would be easier that way because someone dead was likely know, it was the cross that was bugging me...It was clearly meant as a message to me. Maybe even trying to revel itself to me...And even as the thought went through my head it dawned on me I realized I had known all along who it was in the car with me...

Mello. Could he have been who it was?

"Wow how fast are we going?" Lidner called forward.

"Its not my fault!" Rester yelled. "I can't make it slow down."

"What do you mean?" Aizawa asked.

"I mean that I can't make the car go any slower."

"Have you tried the brake peddle?" I asked, what was with everyone and being so incompetent recently, unless...

"Yes Near." He spun the wheel pulling us of on the exit.

"Wow that was the right one I think." Mogi said looking down at the map. "Sorry I missed, it nice catch."

"It wasn't me." Rester said again.

"Watch out!!" I yelled as a young girl wearing bright colors ran across the road. The breaks were hit hard sending me falling out of my chair. I climbed back up looking over at the small town that we had stopped in, it was little only three buildings that mostly looked deserted though there did appear to be light coming from one of the buildings. The four men who were sitting in front of me all piled out of the car, me and the other two came forward to look.

"Theres no one here." Aizawa said.

"I thought I hit that girl." Rester said with confusion look around the sides of the road to try and find the person who had been jogging in front of our car. Weird considering how deserted the area appeared to be.

"Umm everyone." Gevanni said. "According to this map we are in Buncom." Irony, or probably not that girl must have wanted us to stop here...

What? This is where they were leading us? Why Mello? Why here..?


	18. Chapter 18

Lisa came running into the room slamming the door behind as she stopped in the middle of the group.  
"They're here!" She said excitedly.  
"Then where may I ask are they?" L asked flatly, not even bothering to look back at her as he continued to click away on the keyboard in front of him.  
"They're still looking for me. I guess they're a little shaken by my stopping of the car." She shrugged.  
"How'd you stop the car?" I asked daunted by perky way which she had just phrased that.  
"I ran in front of it." She said smiling.  
"What good is that they can't see you?" She laughed this time.  
"She was killed by getting hit by a car." Matt said. "So she can be seen when she runs out in front of traffic, that got them to stop fast I beat!"  
"Then I disappear." She added.  
"Oh like in scary stories." I said, that was a common one I think, at least I knew it had to be if I had heard it before. As it turned out I wasn't very well versed in scary stories...  
"Exactly." Matt said.  
"But I'm not the only one. There are a bunch of us. Some people do it all the time, thats not really my thing, why would I want to scare people?" She shrugged. There was a light knock on the door.  
"Look at this place do you really think that someone is going to answer." A woman said, I figured it was Lidner from the SPK as there weren't any women who worked with us back at the NPA.  
"Well the light is on." I heard Aizawa point out.  
"Well Matsuda are you planning on letting our guest in at any point?" L asked, of duh I had to do that didn't I ? Obviously none of them could just open the door...  
"Right sorry." I pulled the door opened. It was a strange sight to look at, people from my work mixed with the SPK member and to top it off several people from my building; Ado, Thelma, Shingo, and Reiji, whom it was only stranger because they were part of the Yotsuba group. Pearl was also present, she was holding Aizawa's hand, I shuddered that had to be creepy. "Hey." I said feeling awkward. Everyone answered in staggered greetings.  
"Hello." Near said looking me over. "We are going to need you to explain everything."  
"Tell them that we are going to be meeting in the cook house where there are more places to sit, not to mention it is much bigger. That is going to be the place were everything is going to be made clear." L said turning back to look at the group.  
"Umm, we can talk in the cook house, I guess its bigger." I said though it was clear I really didn't know any of this, this didn't to bother any of them as they seemed to trust that I had gotten my information from somewhere.  
"Then lead the way." Near offered.  
"No it not time for that yet." L said. "We all must gather there, it could take up to about twenty three minutes to re-gather the rest of us, and I'm going to need to send Watari to get snacks. Yes, tell them that we need twenty six minutes, then we will meet in there."  
"We need like a half an hour." I said choosing to leave most of it out, it was better just to give them a quick answer rather than ramble on about details.  
"They can wait in there though." Mello add. "With those of us that don't feel like running around looking for people."  
"You can wait in the building if you want." I convayed.  
"Do you keep looking at the ghost?" Near asked scanning the room as his eyes slide over many of the occupants, which I knew he couldn't see. I nodded. "Very interesting."  
"Pearl would you be so kind as to lead our guest there?" L said. Pearl laughed. Before pulling on Aizawa's hand, he followed her quickly.  
"I'll lead them." I said, L shrugged.  
"Suits yourself, but don't think that it gets you out of looking for people." He told me, I nodded before turning back to what I was about to do.  
"Fine." I said running to catch up with Pearl. "Pearl I can take over."  
"Pearl?" Aizawa asked looking around before obviously realizing he couldn't see the person I was talking to.  
"Shes the little girl thats holding your hand." He nodded though there was a sad look on his face as he looked down to the place where his hand was still around hers.  
"Its a little girl?" He asked. "What happened to her, or I mean what happened to you Pearl?" He asked in her general direction.  
"I don't know." I said also looking at her. "Pearl?" I asked her as well. She turned away letting the hand fall back to her side, Aizawa looked around as he must have felt her grip leave.  
"I was sick." She said quietly.  
"Sick." I repeated out loud.  
"Oh its so sad when its kids." I nodded, I hadn't given it that much thought but it really was to think that Pearl had died when she was so little...  
"That building." Pearl pointed. I once had to convay her message.  
"Its that one." I also pointed. The rest of the group started towards the building. "I guess we have to go look for people." I said looking at Pearl.  
"Why can't I wait with them?" She asked looking back to the people who were heading to the building.  
"That might be a little strange for them, you should just come with me." I tried to reason with her.  
"She can wait with us if she wants." Aizawa offered holding his hand out to try and find her.  
"See!" Pearl said smiling taking it in her much smaller one.  
"Is it really okay?" I asked, he couldn't see the girl it seemed like it could be weird for him.  
"Sure. I'm getting more used to it."  
"Alright I'll be back in a little bit." I said waving and running back to the other building.  
"Their all lazy." Matt said walking over to me.  
"Who?" I asked looking around it was back to the people that had been there initially, Matt, Mello, L, Light and me.  
"Them." He indicated the room. "Lisa, Ado and Thelma are looking already, but Reiji and Shigo are lazy too, they need to go help Watari run to the store, and these lazy bones are unwilling to look at all."  
"Actually," Light interjected. "I would look but I'm stuck to L." He pointed out.  
"True, but on account of I don't like you your still lazy." Matt gave a sarcastic smile to Light.  
"I'm not to lazy to look." Mello sneered. "I just don't want to."  
"Much better." Matt smiled.  
"Whatever." Mello stormed out of the room.  
"Shall we start looking." Matt offered, I nodded in agreement.

Near:  
The building was well lit which surprised me, I guess that was because when you think of ghost you think of dark places with rattling chains, though I am almost positive that I did hear some chains while in the other room... I looked around, it was set up with beds along the wall and there was a sitting area with many coaches in the middle. I curled up on one of the them trying to take in more of the stuff that was in the building. Who lives here? I wondered in my head staring blankly about. Mello perhaps? But these lodgings...They didn't seem to suit him, his personality would not take to such drab basic style, he would have added something...Something with more flare, I thought with a quiet laugh to myself. No, if he was here then it was not his permanent residence, it just couldn't be...Growing up the rooms at Wammy house were all the same, white walls and wood floors, ours hadn't stayed that way long thanks to Mello, he filled every surface and every wall with items, things he found mostly, just anything to keep the room from being void of life...Like this was, no even without life there was no way he would let himself live somewhere so dead...This was almost unlived in, this place was more likely connected to... to L.  
"Near are you alright?" Rester asked me sitting on one side of me, I turned away, no need to let emotions betray me to much.  
"Yes Commander Rester I am perfectly alright. I was merely thinking about something."  
"Would you mind me asking what that was?" He said.  
"No, I would not you may ask if you would like." I said, wondering if those that I could see were the only ones in the room, if there were others how would we know? The man laughed.  
"Alright, Near what are you thinking about?"  
"Oh yes. I have already concluded that I think that Mello is responsible for much of this, but I have come to think that L has something to do with this as well." A massive conclusion to say the least, but I knew somehow in my gut that I was right...  
"What makes you think that?"  
"Well I have known Mello a long time. It is true that we are and always have been rivals, and that his weakness was in never admitting that I was smarter. That aside it is also true that we grew up together, you see we were both orphans at the same orphanage not that I am willing to say which one that is to remain a secret. That said for all the things I hated him for he was like family to me, our rivalry was more that of siblings then anything else." I said clenching my hands around the model car in my grasp to keep my voice at its normally steady tone, I had never been one to have trouble with emotions! Never in my life, but maybe it was knowing that they could be in this room, could be near me...  
"But how does that make you think he has to do with this?"  
"The ghost was only trying to help us from the beginning, he lead us here after all, or at least had others do so in order to help us solve the case."  
"But wouldn't Mello be to proud to ask for help?"  
"That is true, but now that he is dead there are many limits on what he can do, and I know if he was going to ask for help it would be from me... That much I know." If only I could be sure, it was childish but the thought of being able to be in the same room again, even without seeing him...At least it would give me a chance to say some of the things I hadn't been able to tell him in life, before he died all we had done was fight, such a terrible end after so many years of knowing one another...I just...Just wanted one more moment..."As for L, we did not know each other as well. I was a lot younger then him, and he was out of the orphanage before I was even born. But I know how he works, because it is not so different from me, though I tend to sprawl my things more. The room that we were in before, it was filled with computers and here we see barren living spaces, that makes me think of him."  
"I'm sure lot of people work like that." Rester suggested.  
"Yes but how many of those people would Mello be willing to work with?" I asked. I felt something hit the back of my head pushing me forward slightly, like someone had slapped me. "What was that?" I looked around and was not surprised to find nobody there. "was that you?" I asked nervously, a rare feeling for me that I was not completely sure how to deal with. Another hit. "Stop it." Another. "Mello!" I snapped staring directly at the place where the hand must be coming from. It stopped. "Mello. If that was you then tap my head twice." As I said this my feelings were strangely mixed...I wanted it to be true, I wanted to know that he was here next to me... But that also scared me, as everyone is scared of the unknown and things that they don't understand, I was scared to be right, but also that I could be wrong... I closed my eyes as my head was hit with two taps. I pressed my eyes closed biting hard on the inside of my lip. "Would you like to wait with me?" I asked. I was hit as if to tell to move over. I scouted closer to Rester allowing Mello to join me on the couch. I felt the space next to me sink in slightly as it would with the weight of a person, felt a cold form rest against mine. My head sank down to my knees to hide my face from view, no need to let anyone know...To see how glad I was to know that I had him there with me. I started slightly as invisible arms wrapped themselves around my curled up body, but let out a breath of released tension as his head rested against mine, I could fell his hair slide against my cheek...

"Brother dearest." I felt my breath catch in my throat, his voice, filled with the same sarcasm as in life that I knew didn't mean he wasn't being sincere. "I hope you know I still won." I let out a laugh, somethings never change...Somehow that was reassuring. I curled closer to him, and we waited for everyone else to arrive.


	19. Chapter 19

It was hard to not laugh looking around the room. It was packed which was an interesting thing considering the fact that many of the people couldn't even see each other. We had managed to gather all the people who were out searching. Mello and Near were curled next to each other on the couch with Commander Rester sitting next to them looking slightly confused, but obviously pleased that Near was content at the moment. Pearl was sitting with the task force, Aizawa's hand still in hers. The rest were scattered throughout, mostly attempting to avoid touching living people to much probably more out of habit than actual necessity. On all the tables around the room were platters of sugary snack foods, at least it was obvious that somethings would never change...  
"So..." L said looking around the room. "The only problem I can see is how we are all going to be talking."  
"I can tell everyone what you all are saying" I informed them.  
"Me to." Cassie said. "If its needed."  
"Sure there are a lot of people here, so I could use the help." I smiled at least having her here meant I wasn't the only one that had to look crazy and like I was talking to myself.  
"Wait." Ide said raising his hand.  
"Tell Mr. Ide he can speak." L said. I shrugged at him.  
"Exactly how many dead people are in the room?" Oh right they can't tell, that would be a little weird...  
"Umm..." I took another look. "Mello, Matt, Pearl, Rose, Thelma, Reiji, Shingo, L, Light, umm, Lisa, Ado, Naomi, Ray, Chief Yagami, Watari was here to drop off the snacks but he left so that was... thirteen I think."  
"That was fourteen." Near corrected.  
"What?"  
"You named fourteen people or ghost." The small white toned child informed me again. I looked around.  
"Right then there are fourteen."  
"You forgot Misa." Misa said jumping up to get my attention.  
"Then fifteen counting Misa." I said correcting myself again. "Your dead?!" I asked she nodded. It was getting harder to keep all these things straight, especially when it was someone I had known living and hadn't even known had died... How sad... "When?"  
"The day that Misa came to live with Light, Misa got here really fast."  
"Did you guys know that Misa was dead?" I asked.  
"Yeah I heard about that." Aizawa said. "Shes in the room?"  
"Yeah." I said pointing to her, the living people instinctively look in her direction, making her laugh and moving to sit closer to them.  
"Can we just get to the point?!" Mello yelled.  
"Right." I nodded.  
"Did someone say something?" Near asked, I laughed, it was odd to see Near confused about that when the speaker was sitting right next to him.  
"Yeah Mello wants us to get to the point." I said. Near smiled looking surprising close to where the older boy was sitting.  
"Some how that figures." He said.  
"Can we get started?" Light asked in a less demanding fashion then Mello, but somehow coming out of him I felt more inclined to do so, maybe it was years of having him tell me what to do...  
"Alright." I nodded.  
"So who should I translate?" Cassie asked.  
"I don't know how do you want to split them up?" I asked.  
"How about by shoe size." Rose offered, of course she would want something that random...  
"But I don't know every ones." I pointed out.  
"You could guess."  
"Well I think Pearls are the smallest."  
"What are you talking about?" Aizawa asked trying to look where I was to see if he could make any sense of what our conversation was about, though that would barely be possible with Rose's side of it, she wasn't exactly easy to follow...  
"Shoe sizes." I said.  
"Why are you talking about that?"  
"Well Rose thinks thats how we should split up who me and Cassie talk for."  
"That seems kinda hard to monitor." Lidner said. "Why not height."  
"Thats a good idea." Rose agreed clapping at the other woman's comment.  
"I'm the shortest." Pearl said.  
"May I make a suggestion." L said cutting in before Rose and Matt could really make the conversation go in circles.  
"Sure." I said indicating for him to speak.  
"Sure what? To the height thing?" Lidner asked.  
"No I was saying sure to something that L said."  
"What did L say?" Near asked, eyes scanning as though place where the person I was referring to was, Mello pushed the shorter boy's head and stopped it so he was looking directly at the dark haired man. "Is he in that seat?" Near asked reaching out to hold onto the blond's arm, who nodded against his shoulder to let him know.  
"Oh right he wants to make a suggestion. So I said sure so now he's gonna say something." I motioned for him to talk.  
"If I'm the only one talking, we will only need one person to tell the rest of the room what I am saying." L smiled.  
"Thats not gonna work." I said.  
"What was the suggestion?" Near asked still looking at what he saw as an empty chair.  
"Right sorry." wow I'm sucking at this. "L just wants to be the only one to talk, but thats not going to work because Rose will talk."  
"Hey why me?" Rose asked cutting in as I had just said always did.  
"Cause you always talk." I pointed out.  
"Just don't tell everyone what shes saying." L said. I nodded, I was just going to have to ignore what she said, that was easier said then done with some of her comments!  
"Thats not fair!" Mello said. "I have just as much right to talk as you do L!"  
"Yes you feel that way, but for now we will have to deal and I will be the only one talking." He looked around at everyone. "Well then lets actually start."

Aizawa:  
My head was starting to hurt... It was like watching bad absurdest theater, not that there was really good absurdest theater, but if there was this definitely not the best...  
"This going to get old fast." I said to Ide and Mogi, who both nodded. "Come on Matsuda just tell us what we need to know."  
"I can't." He said miserably looking this way and that, clearly at people who were all talking to him at the same time.  
"Why not?"  
"Because I don't really know anything, I have to wait until L tells me what he needs to tell you." He said looking as confused as I was feeling, that tended to be the case with things L was saying so I guess I could let him have a little slack on that one...  
"Great, nothings ever going to get done!" I shrugged. I looked down at my hand were I assume that Pearl was sitting, her fingers still holding on to mine. "You don't know how lucky you are to be hearing this whole conversation. 'Cause I'm lost." I felt her squeeze my fingers, maybe she was agreeing...  
"Alright L says that we're starting now." Matsuda said standing up and moving towards the middle of the room. He was watching one of the chairs where I guess L was sitting, it was where Near appeared to be looking as well, of course he would know... "Alright, he said that this is a group that prevents ghost from committing crimes." He laughed. "I'm summarizing... because your using to many words... I'm not repeating word for word... Cassie wouldn't either."  
"Thats true." The dark haired woman interjected, trying to say what L did word for word would be nearly impossible for anyone that wasn't like Light or maybe Near...  
"Alright he agreed that I can summarize. So just so you know L is using a lot more words then me." Yeah hes always using more words then are needed.  
"So like you guys, we have been working on the case with the art theft." Matsuda explained.  
"So that was ghost?" Near clarified. Matsuda nodded looking at someone clearly saying something as he spoke which he didn't say out loud, maybe it was the girl who he said kept interrupting...Rose...Hey that was the girl whose sister we met! So she was involved after all...  
"Yeah, its Aiber and Wedy." He said once again looking for more instructions on what to say.  
"What are we supposed to do then if its ghost can't you deal with it on your own?" I pointed out unable to see what help we could be.  
"I was wondering the same thing." Matsuda said. "Wait L's telling me. Oh that makes sense... Rose stop it I can't concentrate... Matt thats not helping..."  
"What is L saying?" Near asked.  
"Sorry I'm kinda easily distracted."  
"Yeah we know." I mumbled.  
"I said that I'm sorry!" He repeated. "Ok so L said that the ghost are going to take care of Aiber and Wedy, but he says that people are going to be really mad if no one takes the fall for this. We already know where the drop point is that there buyers can pick stuff up. So L wants you guys to arrest them."  
"Thats all?" I asked.  
"Well more or less." Mastuda shrugged. "So we're all going to have to work together to catch everyone that is involved in this whole thing." I felt Pearl let go of my hand.  
"Whats wrong?" I asked trying to look at her.  
"She wants to say something." Mastuda explained looking at her.  
"What?" I asked.  
"I'm only supposed to tell you what L says." He said shooting an annoyed look at the chair L was clearly in, of course he was...  
"Really?"  
"Fine, she says that she was the one that solved the case." He smiled at her as he told us all what she had said.  
"Really? Thats cool." She took my hand back.  
"It was kinda funny because she really was with us, the whole time and helped." He smiled at her again, I looked where he was staring. "Just a second L's talking again... So he said that we should call it a night, in the morning we'll head back to Portland, and finalize the plan."  
"Alright." Near said.  
"And you guys can feel free to stay here tonight."

Matsuda:  
I curled up on one of the small beds in the room we had been meeting in. The lights had all been turned off already and everyone was situated for the night, as it had been easier to have everyone stay the night. I knew that I was going to have a hard time sleeping, so much had happened, there was no way that my mind was going to shut off.  
"Touta?" I heard a small voice say as Pearl quietly sat next to me. "Are you awake?" She asked.  
"Whats wrong?" I asked sitting up to check on her in the dim light coming through the windows.  
"I was just wondering... If you hated me now?" She said looking genuinely concerned.  
"No." I said shocked that she would ask. "Why would I?"  
"Because I lied to you." Her lip was quivering on the verge of tears.  
"Its alright." I tried to comfort her, reaching out take hold of her tiny shoulders.  
"But you don't even know anything about us. I mean earlier when Aizawa asked a question about me you didn't know." I guess that was true. It would be nice to know about the people I lived with. Though I knew about some of them, like Rose she had told me at least how she died, even if it did happen to be an odd way to have gone...  
"Here." She handed me an old looking book.  
"What is this?" I asked flipping it between my hands delicately so not to damage it.  
"Its my scrapbook. I thought I don't know that you might want to see it." She finished looking away. "Its kinda silly I guess, I could just tell you, but..." She scrunched up her face trying to turn away, I smiled and rubbed her arm lightly.  
"Thanks." I flipped it open to find a newspaper clipping; it was a yellow brown color from age, there was a picture, though the quality was low, it showed two young girls wearing matching short frilly dresses, both their hair in ringlets. The taller of the two was clearly Pearl... The headline said _Local Theater Host Very Own Vaudeville Smash_.  
"Vaudeville?" I asked. She smiled.  
"Yeah thats me and June a few months before I died."  
"June?" The only other person in the picture was a kid even younger then Pearl..?  
"Thats right, shes my little sister." Her little sister!? But she was old...Pearl turned the pages through similar stories and pictures. She stopped on one suddenly. This one was smaller then the rest, _Pearl Denten 1921-1927 _.  
"Is this your obituary?"  
"Yep." She laughed. "Its alright it used to freak me out to. Well actually it just used to make me really sad, but not anymore as you can see that was a long time ago. Not like June she lived a full life thats why shes older then me now, shes even older then daddy." She laughed again.  
"Where's he?" I asked.  
"Oh, I lived with him for year... Well when I first died I lived with his parents, than after that with him, but I decided that I wanted some freedom. So thats why I choose to live on my own. Not that I'm really alone there are tons of adults in the house."  
"And your sister."  
"She just died more recently, I wanted to spend some time with her." The girls head drooped. "Well you can give that back later I think I should go to bed..."  
"Whats wrong?" I asked before she could walk away, taking hold of her to stop her.  
"Nothing, its just..." She looked around as if to find the words. "I only ever knew her when she was like four and you've seen her now it would have... been nice to have something in between. To you know actually know her as a person." The girl had tears in her eyes but remained composed, an odd sight on such a small child. "Any ways thats life." She stood up, but I lightly pulled her back down giving her a warm hug. I could only imagine, it must be so scary for her... I felt her soften slightly in my grasp and nuzzle her head on my shoulder. After a few moments she stood up. "Good night, sorry to be a creepy over sharer." She smiled, I reached out whipping her cheeks dry.  
"Don't be silly, I was happy to listen. Good night Pearl." I waved as she skipped off to find her bed. Yeah there was definitely no way that I was going to be sleeping...


	20. Chapter 20

"...I know that you have already said that. As I said though we are going to be leaving tomorrow." Lidner was trying to stay calm well still hold her ground. "Please, it has to be today. yeah I understand. Thank you for you time." She said through her phone across the room from me. "There is officially no way that you can possibly get a tour of the Shanghai Tunnels with a days notice."  
"Are they even that busy?" I asked, from what I had heard about this place it was cool, but not really that popular...  
"There not open today for tours." She rolled her eyes.  
"Tell her that they should try claiming that Near is dying or something." Rose offered. I shook my head.  
"I'm not saying that." I said causing her to stick her tongue out with a laugh.  
"Do we even know that they're planing to have a pick up today?" Aizawa asked rolling his eyes.  
"Well actually its not definite that they are planing to do any thing today." L told me in answer to the other mans question.  
"L said it might not be today." I said smiling at the woman who had been on the phone for almost an hour. I was glad to not be in Buncom anymore, the place had been weird and creepy. We all came back to Portland, well most of us...Once in the city only those of us that were involved with case had come back to the hotel room were Near was staying along with the rest of the investigators. Of the ghost only L, Light, Mello, Rose, Matt and Pearl had stayed with us.  
"We're ghost I'm sure that we can manage to sneak in!" Mello yelled. "This is so ridicules trying to get in being a problem, what a joke!"  
"You looked at someone what did they say?" Near asked from the floor were he had set up a train track that Mello kept messing up when he looked away.  
"Mello thinks the ghost should just sneak in." I said.  
"Well Mello." Near said. "Some of us happen to not be dead and therefore that might be a little harder for us to do."  
"Its not like Near would be the one sneaking in anyways."Mello sneered.  
"Let me guess Mello said something mean?" The younger boy asked replacing the train where he had left it for the hundredth time. I nodded. "Some people are so predictable."  
"Lets not get off topic. We need a plan." L said to the general room.  
"Guys L says we need a plan." I said.  
"I have a plan." Rose said.  
"Really?" I asked.  
"Well I really have many plans."  
"Are any of them relevant?" She made a face like she was thinking hard.  
"Take that as a no." Matt said. "But I do have something."  
"Who are you bickering with?" Aizawa asked looking in the direction I was looking.  
"Its just Rose, but Matt said that he has a plan."  
"Wait maybe I missed this, but why aren't we just saying its an investigation?" Gevanni asked.  
"Well," Near said. "There are several reasons, one the thieves might find out about something like that, they quit possibley have some kind of mole in the staff of the tunnels, and second this is a secret investigation." Near smiled. "Anymore questions?" No one said anything. "Matt you may talk."  
"Alright so," Matt started. "I'll go over this and then you can just summarize." I nodded. "There are two main entrances that I can think of, but I'm no expert I've only been there a few times... One is located on the side walk and you go through these metal doors that one is kept locked, the other entrance you get in though a trapdoor that is located in a bar over the tunnels, that one is activated by a lever behind the bar. It was used back when the tunnels were made to abduct drunk sailors to sell, hence them being Shanghai Tunnels. So basically its a bunch of tunnels underground, which might be hard to navigate if we don't stay on the tour path." He said stating this fact as if it should have been obvious. "So here is the plan..."

Aizawa:  
I looked around the place scouting it out for any possible problems. The place was empty aside from those that were with us. I was sitting at the bar with Matsuda, Lidner was a little further away talking to the bartender and the others, Ide and Mogi, were sitting at a table together.  
"Really you've lived here your whole life?" Halle was saying in her best attempt to sound charming. I can't believe we are actually relying on her charm as part of our plan... "Is it true that there are tunnels under this building?"  
"Thats right." He said smiling. Clearly the plan was working.  
"I guess we have to get going." Mogi said loudly.  
"Oh yeah look at the time." Ide added. Wow they really seamed to be over doing it... Acting clearly was not their strong point, not that it was mine or Matsuda's for that point, he was looking suspicious just sitting there. I felt the now familiar squeeze of Pearl taking my hand and quickly letting go. That was the signal. Matsuda stood up.  
"I'll be right back." He said moving only a few feet away and stopping. I was glad that the bartender wasn't looking cause it was obvious how scared he was. All of a sudden the trap door under him opened with a loud crunching sound of the latch followed by a scream and a thud.  
"Oh my god what was that?!" Lidner yelled running over.  
"The door!" The bartender was close behind. "I'm so sorry is he alright?!" I was already to the opening in the floor. There was no one there. I shock my head. Lidner screamed, nice effect on that one... Maybe she wasn't such a terrible actor...  
"What if hes dead!" I looked back she had grabbed hold of the man's arm and was not letting go as she let out frantic rambling. That was good we couldn't have him see this yet. I heard a whistle from the tunnel.  
"Hey were ready." I looked to see Gevanni standing there. This is never going to work. "Help!" He yelled.  
"Yeah help" I added. "I need help to pull him up." I grabbed hold of the other man's hand. I was quickly joined by the other to occupant of the bar who were all trying to see who had fallen in the tunnels.  
"Hes dead." Lidner said dramatically still holding onto the bartender as returned to where everyone else was standing.  
"Look hes fine." The man said offering his hand as well, together we pulled Gevanni up. He was now covered in dirt. "Are you alright?"  
"Yeah I'm alright just a little shaken." He said standing up.  
"I can't believe this happened." The man shook his head. "It went off without warning earlier today I should have taken a better look at the lever that opens the door."  
"Don't worry about it really." I said trying my best to sound concerned, but like I didn't care...I mean the guy did think that my friend had just fallen a hole in his bar!  
"Listen your drinks are on the house all three of you." He looked at each of us.  
"Oh thats to much." Lidner said. "I wasn't even involved!"  
"No don't worry." He said. "Are you really alright?" He asked Gevanni again.  
"Really I'm fine."  
"You should at least go to the hospital and have them look at you. Theres no way that you didn't hurt something. And we'll make sure that the bar takes care of any expenses."  
"Thank you." Gevanni smiled. "Lets get going." I helped him get up even though he was perfectly capable of doing so...  
"What time is it by the way?" Lidner asked looking at the clock. "Oh my god I should get going." She hurried out before us but we were close to follow behind waving as we left.  
"I can't believe that that even worked." Lidner said laughing as we headed back to the van.  
"Yeah tell me about it." I muttered, it was really unbeliable, guess it proved something about people that everything gone off without question. The van was a block away were Rester was waiting for us to join him. I was glad that everything had worked, I just couldn't stop thinking about how lucky we were... There had been so many places that it could have gone wrong. The first part was easy. Pearl, Rose, Matt and Mello had gone to the bar earlier in the day. Pearl had set off the trap door and the other three had climbed down to wait for the rest of the team. Later the first shift of people arrived, consisting of Mogi and Ide. They ordered lunch and pretended to just be customers at the restaurant. Me and Matsuda were next, well actually Pearl was with us as well, we also just ordered lunch, but we were seated at the bar. Last was Lidner who arrived by her self got a drink and flirted with the bartender. She kept him distracted until Pearl was able to get the keys off of him without him noticing, then Pearl gave the keys to Mogi and Ide who went out side and met up with Gevanni, who we had wearing the same thing as Matsuda. Unfortunately the door to the tunnels is located in front of giant bay window of the shop. So for them to get in we needed a distraction. So Pearl showed Matsuda to the trap door then she ran behind the bar and set it off. The three ghost that were already down there caught him. Here we found some technical difficulties, we knew that Matsuda had to be the one to fall through the doors, for two reasons, one being that the ghost were the only ones that knew were the door was to show him, but the more important reason was that he was the only one that they could catch. So the fall with some help from Lidner distracting the bartender or long enough for Mogi, Ide and Gevanni to get down to into the tunnels and for Matsuda and Gevanni to switch places, this was one of the most important things, as only he could see the ghosts who were leading the way. We figured that the bar tender would be shaken enough to not notice the that we had switched men, and thankfully he had not.

Matsuda:  
I breathed a sigh of relief as the door closed over our heads.

It worked, I thought closing my eyes, it really worked. Around us it was pitch black, though as my eyes adjusted I was able to make out what looked like old mining tunnels with cages on the far wall...  
"That was pretty awesome." Rose said. "We should all become con-men."  
"I think thats what we are trying to stop." Matt pointed out.  
"Always with the logic." She rolled her eyes.  
"It was kind of cool." Pearl said laughing.  
"Hey child your not supposed to even be here." Matt said. That was true, the plan had been that she was going to go wait in the van but she had jumped down to join us during the commotion.  
"I'm a part of this investigation to you know! Plus its just not fair that your trying to make me not come." Pearl said in a huff.  
"Your lucky we let you have anything to do with this at all." Mello said turning to get his bearings of the place surrounding us.  
"Hey why would I not be allowed to help?"  
"Maybe 'cause you like six years old."  
"I've been six since before you were born." Pearl shot at the blond boy stamping her foot as she spoke to emphasize her point.  
"So?"  
"So its not fair at all." Pearl sat down.  
"Don't worry Pearl your helping us now. So its alright." I looked over at Mogi and Ide they seemed to have just accepted that they were not always going to understand what was going on and seemed to just watch waiting to be addressed.  
"We have four ghost and three humans." I said.  
"I thought that we are supposed to have only three ghost." Ide pointed out.  
"We ended up with an extra one." Pearl smiled at me.  
"Alright." Ide said with a nod.  
"I think that we should split up one ghost to one human and Pearl can go were she wants. That way we can have a chance to catch either of the two sets of criminals and still cover a lot of ground."  
"Don't you think that might get a little confusing for them." I pointed to my living friends.  
"I'm not saying that its going to be the most fun stake out in the world I'm just saying that its what has to happen."  
"I agree." Mello said.  
"I so call being with Touta 'cause I can only go like a minute without talking." Rose said.  
"Maybe less." Matt added.  
"Less what?" She asked.  
"Less then a minute, come on Rose keep up."  
"Well I'm sorry I didn't realize that your stupid and mean."  
"And you've known me how long?" He asked raising an eye brow.  
"Good point." She laughed.  
"So what they're saying," I told Mogi and Ide, "is that we should split up one ghost to one human."  
"Sounds good." Mogi said.  
"What? We are going to separate in a dark tunnel filled with ghost?" Ide asked making me laugh.  
"Its not that scary."  
"Says the guy that can see them."  
"Don't worry there friendly ghost." I tried to reassure him.  
"Yeah I'm the friendliest ghost I make Casper seem like a bad ass." Rose said laughing. "Make sure to tell them that."  
"I'm really not saying that." I said  
"But I'm the friendliest." She pouted.  
"Is it just me or doesn't that sound wrong?" Matt said.  
"Thats a little forward." She said.  
"Lets just split up." Mello said hitting Mogi upside the head. "Tell him lets get going."  
"Mello wants you to go with him Mogi." He nodded.  
"But how will I know which way to go?" Mello hit him again.  
"Tell him to just walk straight and I'll make sure he knows when to turn."  
"Hes going to hit you to tell you when to turn." I said.  
"Great." Mogi sighed as he was hit forward sending them both down the corridor.  
"I guess that means that I'm with him." Matt said pointing to Ide.  
"I guess so." I said. "Ide your with Matt alright."  
"Yeah thats fine, but is he going to hit me to make me move?" Ide asked.  
"I can't do that, so tell him that he doesn't have to worry. Pearl will lead him to our stake out point."  
"But I want to go with Touta and Rose." Pearl said.  
"You can go meet up with them I just need you to lead the way." Matt explained.  
"Oh thats not so bad. Lets go." She grabbed hold of Ide's hand and pulled him along.  
"What was that?" He asked.  
"Its just Pearl shes a little girl and she is going to lead you." I told him as Matt ran to catch up with them.  
"I guess that just leaves us then." Rose said. "Follow I know a cool place to wait on our stake out." She laughed as she took the lead.  
"What are you laughing at?"I asked.  
"Its funny that I'm on a stake out I mean have you met me?" She laughed again.  
"Thats true." I smiled.  
"Turn." She said as we went into a small room that had a row of large shelves that looked like bunk beds.  
"What is this place?" I asked.  
"Its an old opium den." She said.  
"Thats kinda cool." I said.  
"Yeah, but I like to be able to do opium well on the job."  
"Are you really going to do opium?"  
"Most definitely I mean its not like this place has not been in uses for like a zillion years."She said making fun of me.  
"Well it was worth asking."  
"Sure your totally right." She sat on the bottom bunk. "Now I have bottom bunk so your gonna hurt your self."  
"How so?"  
"Cause the people on the high bunks got hurt falling off."  
"Why did they fall?"  
"Umm... They were doing opium." She said rolling her eyes. "Duh."  
"Oh yeah I guess that would do it." I said.  
"Rose! Touta!" Pearl called. "Are you in here?" She asked looking in.  
"No, no one here but us chicken." Rose said.  
"What does that even mean?" Pearl asked.  
"Whats funny is that I don't know." Rose said.  
"Your so dumb." Pearl said climbing up to one of the higher beds. "Ahhh!" She jumped down looking scared.


	21. Chapter 21

"Whats wrong?" I jumped up to check on Pearl who had fallen to the ground on her back from the bunk bed.  
"There was someone there!" She said looking scared. Rose laughed.  
"Really thats what scared?" She hoped up to climb to the top bunk herself in order to see what had scared the younger girl. "Hey man." She said shaking something that was lay on the bed which I couldn't see from the ground. "Whats wrong with you? Its just a person." She said to Pearl who was standing now by my side.  
"What?" I heard a man say. He shoot up so that I was able to see him but this caused him to hit his head on the ceiling and fall back a little.  
"Wow watch it buddy." Rose said still laughing.  
"Ouch." He rubbed his head. "What are you people doing down here? I don't know you."  
"We don't live here we're just visiting." She explained offering him a hand down.  
"Thanks." He said as he took it. "Are you looking for someone?" He looked around at the three of us with slightly unfocused eyes.  
"Yes actually." I said. "But not someone that lives here, someone who would come down often though..."  
"Oh you must be looking for the guys that keep leaving stuff down here." He smiled raising an eyebrow. "Am I right?" He asked again looking at us all for a sign that he was right.  
"Bingo." Rose said and in an almost serious way she asked him a question. "You don't happen to know were to find them do you?" He shrugged and than nodded.  
"I certainly can do that, find them I mean, but..." He trailed off.  
"I should have figured that there would be a but." Rose said rolling her eyes at me, I nodded at her there was always a but with people who were kinda shady...Thats why cops generally tried to avoid working with them...It was obviously necessary most of the time though...  
"Oh now I have to think of something." He stopped to think.  
"You said but before you thought of something." Unbelievable! Dumb and trying to get something out of us, only when I was with Rose and Pearl could I meet someone this ridiculous...  
"Well I knew that I would want something in return..." He looked embarrassed. The man was really fairly young to have died...but why would even a ghost want to live in a place like this of they had a choice on where to go?  
"Then lets just say that in return then we can do a favor for you." I offered.  
"Yeah that makes sense." He nodded. "That can be the plan. Follow me." He started back out of the room. Rose had started laughing again.  
"Whats up?" I asked.  
"Pearl," she looked over at the younger girl. "You were scared of a ghost."  
"I was not." Pearl argued.  
"Did you not jump back."  
"Well yeah, but thats not because it was a ghost that was because it was surprising."  
"What kind of a ghost is afraid of ghost." Rose shook her head. "Total fail."  
"Whatever." Pearl said stomping her foot and looking away.  
"Fine be like that." Rose ran ahead to walk with our new companion.  
"I was not scared just startled." Pearl huffed.  
"I know." I said smiling at her. "Hey Pearl does he live down here?" The girl nodded.  
"Thats right. I believe so at least.." She shrugged.  
"Why would anyone choose to live here?" I motioned to the halls surrounding me, it was not only dark and depressing, but filled with people on tours all day, what appeal could it have?  
"He must have died here." She said.  
"So?"  
"Some ghost have trouble letting go of the places that they died. Sometimes because they died violently, but also just because they are scared. Like my friend Micheal, he got lost at Oaks Park, the amusement park that he lives in, so hes scared that if he leaves that then his parents wouldn't be able to find him."  
"Doesn't he know that hes dead?"  
"Yeah well he wants them to find him when they die." She smiled. "It makes sense, I guess. And as for violent death it can take a lot longer for the ghost to feel ready to move away from the place that it happened. Thelma for example she was murdered in Cathedral park and still lives there and that was 1949. Mello has been trying to get her to come live in our building, but hasn't had that much luck."

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"Hey guys hurry up!" Rose yelled back at us.  
"We're almost there." The man said. "You see they leave stuff over here." He stopped in front of an opening, it was a large archway in a brick wall which lead to a corridor. The whole area seemed surprisingly intact for how old everything was... It was still dark but there did seem to be some light coming from the other side of the opening. "This is the port were they would sell us off to sailors."  
"You were sold?" Pearl asked.  
"Oh no not me." He smiled. "I died well still down here, waiting."  
"Oh I'm sorry." She said.  
"Thats alright, its not bad I get to scare tourist and well what can be better then that."  
"I know." Rose added. "I try to tell that to my boyfriend all the time but he just doesn't get it."  
"Wait so this is were Aiber and Wedy are going to drop the art off?" I asked trying to get us all back on topic, a hard task when you have Rose with you, she wasn't exactly a person that stayed on topic well...  
"Yeah." The man said. "I just said that. See down that way is a boat entrance those are far less guarded, then the ground ones making it a good way for them to just pull up and drop off, nice and simple." Oh god Aizawa is going to kill me when he hears that there was an easier way to sneak in, but I guess that figured saying as their buyers must have to do it, and theres no way that the bartender wouldn't notice if people were pulling stunts like ours on a daily basis. "See proof." I looked over to see what the man had picked up. He was holding a pile of money fanning it. Wow I had never seen so much money just lay somewhere, I could never imagine placing that down on the ground in god faith that I was going to get something in return! These people were strangely trusting for having dealings with underground activities...  
"Whats that doing here?" Rose asked.  
"Don't you remember." Pearl said. "They told us when we talked to them. The buyers leave the money and then they bring the art, and the buyer has to come back and get it. Come on Rose really." The girl laughed. "What kind of investigator are you?" She smiled at the taller girl.  
"I'm the best detective, I'm like the freaking Hardy Boys." Rose shoot back. "Can't you tell by my perfectly feather hair." She laughed fluffing the stray pieces of her hair that had fallen from the ponytail.  
"Your so weird." Pearl said taking the money to count it. Her eyes widened. "They must be selling something good. I've never seen so much money in my life." Funny how we thought so much alike at times, it was probably a little sad for me as she was six years old...  
"Pretty much any of that stuff is going to bring in a lot of money." I said, this was fine that we were talking about after all...  
"Well judging from the time they should be here soon or at least..."  
"Do you see anyone?" I heard a girl's voice ask, but I didn't recognize it. She sounded young...  
"No." I heard a second girl respond. They seemed to be coming from the other side of the opening.  
"Hide." He said. Pushing us all into a corner. "Stay here. They check the halls to make sure that theres no one in here. So stay." He said before running out of the shadows. I sunk down to the floor, it was covered in leather shoes that had clearly been here for a long time. It was darker here I could see were we had been standing but was blind to anything close. I felt Pearl curl into me trying to make herself smaller and could make out enough of Rose to see that she was standing. I pulled her pant leg to get her attention.  
"Stay down." I hissed.  
"Its alright I'm in the shadows, they can't see me."  
"Thats not true."  
"Yeah it is it worked on Nancy Drew."  
"Can we stop with the 70s television references." I said pulling her down with a slight thud by my side, at least there was one reference she made that I was able to keep up with!  
"Hey that hurt." I put my hand over her mouth as the two young woman walked into the room. They were both wearing simple dress and no shoes, not what I would have called as being part of a high end art theft ring. They both stopped when they saw our guide standing there.

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"I'll deal with him." The one that had talked first said. "You should finish checking the area." The other girl nodded, before heading out to continue her search. I hoped that she wouldn't stumble across any of the rest of us. Not that the rest of the task force would really notice, but it might make us lose our opportunity.  
"What are you doing in here?" The girl asked, looking the man up and down.  
"I live here." He smirked. "You should know that. We've lived in the same lonely tunnel for over a hundred years." She sneered at him rolling her eyes bitterly.  
"I know who you are! I just want to know what your doing here!" She snapped.  
"Wow hold your horses." She rolled her eyes again.  
"Wheres the money." She looked around the area where we had just been standing.  
"I don't know." He shrugged. I looked down at Pearl who still had the money.  
"What do I do?" She whispered.  
"You took the money?" I heard the girl ask in a condescending way to the man from the opium den. "What got sick of pick pocketing tourist?" She snarled, he shrugged looking about as well.  
"I didn't touch the money."  
"I saw it this morning for god sake. I know that you took it! Who the hell else would have?!" She waved her hands questioningly in a somewhat frantic way.  
"I don't know maybe one of the people from the tours."  
"Theres no tours today."  
"I mean like a tour guide or someone cleaning."  
"They don't clean the tunnels. You really didn't come up with a better excuse then that! You really are pathetic." She laughed.  
"Maybe it was blown away." He offered his face lighting up.  
"If it was blown away then it would still be around here somewhere." She swung her arms around herself. "So where is it?"  
"Give me a chance to look." He said.  
"Fine take all the time you need, but don't even think about leaving my sight."  
"I know thats how all the girls feel."  
"Just find the money." She said glaring at him.  
"Will do." He bowed his head down. Before quickly moving over to us barely pretending to look in other places. "Money." he whispered leaning down to us.  
"Here." Pearl shoved it into his hands. "Take it."  
"Found it." He said skipping back over to the girl.  
"Was it right were you put it for safe keeping?" She asked.  
"No, I'll have you know that if I was going to steel the money I would have just taken it. Obviously."  
"Just give me the money." She held her hand out.  
"Yes of course." He handed it to her. "Thank you. Now would you mind leaving."  
"What ever you say." He danced away leaving us alone with just this girl, but not for long because she was re joined by the girl who had left.  
"Clear." The second girl said.  
"Good lets go." I watched as the two girls left back down the way that they had come from.  
"That was so awesome." Rose said. "I'm such a super sleuth."  
"What?" I asked.  
"I'm a sleuth and I'm super. I would say something ever so clever here, but you made rules against it."  
"I said no 70s TV."  
"Yeah have you looked at this situation, what other kind of joke is there to make?"  
"I don't know." Pearl said. "Why not something more clever like... I don't Sherlock Holmes."  
"So done."  
"And Nancy Drew isn't?"  
"Not as bad. Plus what would I say, Pearl your my Watson, lame." Rose rolled her eyes.  
"Fine." Pearl said. "Make you dumb jokes all you want, but they're just not funny."  
"Think what you want, but I know that I'm damn funny." Rose stuck her tongue out.  
"Guys shh." I said as I heard people approaching.


	22. Chapter 22

**Hey, sorry about not updating last week, it was dead week and I was moving out of my dorm. So I hope that you enjoy this weeks chapter and I hope that I'm back on schedule of a chapter a week. **

Near:  
It seemed odd that we hadn't heard from them... Mr. Mogi and Mr. Ide had both already checked in, and the other four were all sitting in the van with me. I had decided that because of the importance of the situation I was willing to stay in a van at a safe distance away from were anything would actually be happening, something that I normally would rather not do, I preferred the safe distance of a hotel room. I stared down at the phone were we were supposed to receive calls when each member of the team reached there stake out locations, but we had not heard from Mr. Matsuda.  
"Maybe hes going further into the tunnels then the rest of them." Gevanni offered looking back from the computer screen he was observing.  
"Yes that is possible." I said. "I really should have put some form of tracker on each of them this not knowing is really not working for me."  
"We should go down there." Aizawa said sounding more agitated by the situation then me, more than likely this was because he was not only annoyed by the fact that we hadn't heard from his officer because it was hindering the movement of the case, but also because he was clearly worried about the other man's safety. Of course he wasn't going to admit that out loud...  
"How the heck are we going to do that?" Lidner asked.  
"I don't know theres got to be a way." Yes one we didn't use...If there was it would have made things hundreds of times easier...Some people honestly didn't think before speaking...  
"Are you stupid? It was hell to get the three of them down there, we are not doing that again." She rolled her eyes. "Why don't we just call?" She reached for the phone, but I quickly slapped her hand away.  
"Lidner please use your brain, if they have not called there is a chance that they are currently in a situation that requires that they don't talk, like for example they might be with our culprits, and if that were the case calling could be the worst possible thing that we could do." And her..! Good help was obviously hard to find at times, but I had thought better of Lidner.  
"Oh yeah I guess I didn't think of that." She slouched back in her seat flicking a button under the screen that was in front of her.  
"Well we can't just do nothing." Aizawa said just as annoyed as before.  
"Actually that is exactly what I plan to do." I said. "I'm going to stay here and wait until I get a call." The phone rang. I looked down to see who it was. "As I was saying there really is nothing to worry about."

Matsuda  
"Hold your end up Aiber." I heard Wedy demand as soon as they came into ear shoot of the location we were watching from.  
"I've got it." He retorted.  
"No your going to drop it." She was clearly annoyed, this wasn't particularly different though as she always seemed a little irritated by everything that was happening around her.  
"Well excuse me but there are three of you on that side." Oh so the girls we saw before were obviously helping move whatever was being sold today.  
"Stop complaining."  
"I'm not I just thought I'd point it out."  
"Fine whatever!"  
"Don't let go."  
"If your going to complain then you three can carry it." Wedy was the first one in to the room, she was stomping sending echos through the tunnels from her high shoes, she was dressed as she always was but somehow the look seemed odd in the surroundings. "I hope they at least left the money this time I really do hate when we come all the way here for nothing." She looked around looking irritated by not seeing it.  
"I have it." I heard the girl who had been talking to the man call as her the other girl and Aiber made their way through the opening holding a massive painting, the girls on one side and Aiber on the other as I had thought from their conversation.  
"Do we get to arrest them yet?" Pearl asked from where she was sitting by my side.  
"Well I guess so." I whispered. "I think that we are supposed to call for back up from the others."  
"But its just them, I think that we can handle it ourselves. Don't you?" I really did have to agree, I mean we knew these people its not like they would do anything to us if we did intervene after all they had been more then happy to let us know what they were up to in the first place.  
"I want to arrest them." Rose said in a huff, as always she was trying to run into action before thinking it through, not that I was one to talk as I normally wasn't to quick to think out my moves before hand, but Rose made me look careful and composed.  
"No fair." Pearl whined. "I'm the one that has done all the work." She definitely had done more work than Rose, I mean she was the one to find the case from the get go, but mostly I was worried about her size compared to Aiber in particular. She wouldn't be able to capture them most likely.  
"Guys I think that we should try to stay a little quieter.'' I offered the people we were watching just weren't that far from where we sat, and at the volume they both were choosing it was likely that they would hear us...  
"Yeah Rose! See, you have to be quite." Pearl said poking the other girl's arm.  
"He was talking to you little girl." Rose stuck her tongue out.  
"What are you babbling about!" Wedy asked loudly looking up from the money that she had been counting on a crate that was on the floor, she scanned the room to see Aiber who she thought had been speaking, but for obvious reasons he had no idea who it was.  
"I didn't say anything." Aiber shoot back. "Why do you blame everything on me?!"  
"Yes, because there is anyone else that could have been talking, moron..."  
"Its not like no one died down here, its like the happening spot for dead things. Anyone could have been talking, were not ever as alone as you think when were down here." Aiber shot back at his partner.  
"I believe that we had the area checked." Wedy pointed out turning on the two girls next.  
"We did check." The girl said, making the quieter of the two nod her head.  
"We did." She agreed still nodding.  
"Well was there anyone?" Wedy asked condescendingly, if they said they checked she knew what they meant.  
"No there was not, but I was not the one to look." The louder girl responded sweeping her dark hair out of her face to look at the other girl who made herself visually smaller as though trying to disappear into the dark around them.  
"There was no one." The lighter haired girl said curling in even farther to hide from Wedy's glaring.  
"That settles that." Wedy said. "So either you were talking or they messed up. Is that what your saying, that you think that they messed up?" She shot at the only man with them.  
"Wow, that is so not what I was saying! Don't change my words I'm sure that it was just the wind. Calm down for Christs sake."  
"Fine lets just get out of here." Wedy said exasperatedly.  
"That was close." Rose whispered into my ear, but of course her whisper was not nearly quiet enough to keep from being heard by everyone in the area. I quickly threw my hand over her mouth trying to keep her from continuing, but in the process knocking her over into a pile of shoes sending dust everywhere and taking me down to the ground as well.  
"Aahhchu." Pearl sneezed. Oh shit was the only thought that I could manage...  
"What was that?" Wedy turned back spinning around to see in every direction. "You all heard that?" They all started looking around with her now. The three of us froze, hoping that by some miracle they would not see us of course we knew it was barely possible...  
"I definitely heard that." Aiber said.  
"I think it came from over there." The light haired girl pointed in our direction.  
"Aiber go find out what that was!" Wedy yelled. He made an annoyed face at her for yelling, but obeyed the command quickly. The dust had not fully cleared before Aiber had grabbed me  
and Rose by the arms and pulled us out to the middle of the room dropping us down with a thud. Wedy was the first one to recognize that she knew us and this didn't seem to make her any less mad.  
"What are you doing here?" She asked placing her hands on her hips in annoyance.  
"We're here..." I tried to start lying to her but was cut off before I could continue.  
"Selling cookies!" Rose blurted out in her always present immature way.  
"Your selling cookies?" Wedy repeated looking at Rose first and than rounding on me with the same evil glare.  
"No." I said trying to cover for her before she dug us into a deeper pit then we already were in.  
"Yes we are." Rose hit me. "You know Thin Mints, Samoas, Tagalongs, Do-Si-Dos, Trefoils and even Daisy Go Rounds. You know the works." Aiber laughed, he was trying to contain it but Rose was being completely ridiculous and it wasn't unobvious...  
"What the hell are you talking about Rose? Why are you really here?" He asked composing himself slightly when he to received a burning look from Wedy.  
"I totally just told you. I'm a girl scout, and I really need my next badge." She turned to me. "Umm and him, hes also a girl scout." Aiber was now nodding his head.  
"That makes perfect sense." He smiled.  
"I think that they're lying." The dark haired girl said.  
"Thank you for stating the obvious." Wedy said bluntly pressing a finger to her temple as though our very presence was causing her great pain. "They are clearly lying. So are you still trying to stop us? This is truly childish of you."  
"Thats really not why we're here." I said still trying to work on a reason that we would be here that had nothing to do with them, of course there was little reason for us to be here...Oh god what were we going to do...  
"Don't lie to me. You are terrible at it." Wedy snapped. "Aiber please restrained them right now!"  
"Sorry." He muttered taking hold of us both at the same time, he really did look it but was obviously avoiding getting in trouble.  
"Hey, Thierry I'll give you a zillion bucks if you let us go." Rose offered with a smile, he clearly didn't mind her antics as he nodded at her.  
"As tempting as that sounds I think I can't do that right this moment." He laughed tightening his grip on us, yes he was a nice person but that only went so far when it came to criminal dealings.  
"You didn't see them." Wedy said rounding on the quite girl.  
"I didn't check this room." She said nervously backing away from the other woman. "It was Betsy." She indicated the louder dark haired girl. "She was the one that checked in here."  
"Dorthy." She hissed. Part of me noted their names when she said them as though they were people I was being introduced to for the first time, odd how you brain does that kind of thing even in this kind of situation...  
"Really. Betsy did you check this room?" Wedy questioned glaring at us once again.  
"Yes I did." Betsy said.  
"And you didn't see anyone else here?" Wedy was not looking amused .  
"I was kind of distracted there was someone in here when we first arrived so I had I had to deal with that."  
"Someone being in the room didn't make you think maybe there could possibly be anyone else in the room? That wasn't really clever of you was it?" She sneered in away that seemed like she should be rolling her eyes if she could be seen behind her sunglasses.  
"I'm sorry." Betsy muttered. "I didn't think about it."  
"Clearly." She walked over to one of the piles of shoes and picked up some rope. She tossed it to Aiber. "Tie them up."  
"Alright." He muttered. "Matsuda I'm going to let go of you, so I can tie her up so don't do anything just sit." I sat down by his feet as he started to restrain Rose. This was it, I had to do something. I needed to get in touch with everyone else. I reached into my pocket to pull out my phone flipping it opened.  
"Phone!" Dorthy yelled. Damn what the hell could I do?  
"Really." Aiber pulled it out of my hand. "Why are people always so difficult?" He chucked the phone away, there goes any chance. I felt him pull me back up and tie my hands. I looked at Rose who I was now attached to.  
"Bring them to the boat." Wedy commanded as she started out followed by the two girls. Aiber pulled us after them by the rope.  
"I bet this is what it felt like to be kidnapped by pirates." Rose said with a laugh, of course she found this funny, was there anything she didn't think was hilarious!  
"Pirates?" I asked.  
"Yeah, like that part in Peter Pan." Rose smiled, really? That was what she was thinking about at this moment...  
"This is really not the time." I said, for once being the sensible one in a situation, something that didn't happen to me very often.  
"I'm just trying to help." She looked down to ground, this was a serious spot we were stuck in and I could only hope she would come to realize that soon.  
"Guys quite down or we're all going to get skinned." Aiber said as we caught up to the others.

Near:  
I flipped the phone opened. A picture? I read the screen telling me that I had received a picture message... Why would he have done that? Logically there was no reason to not just call. Unless...  
"Whats wrong?" Aizawa asked looking over my shoulder.  
"Nothing its just odd." In pressed the button to open it. The picture that flashed on the screen was fuzzy, but the middle could be made out, it seemed to be shoes that were arranged to spell HELP.


	23. Chapter 23

* * *

**Sorry I missed another week. Looks like I'm not that cleaver during the summer. Hope you enjoy it. **

Aizawa:

Shit! I thought looking at the picture on my cell phone. What the hell have you gotten yourself into Matsuda!? I grabbed the phone, clearly it would be no use to try and call him, but I had to do something or else this would just end up getting more out of hand... I dialed Ide's number.  
"Hello?" He said quietly.  
"Hey have you seen Matsuda?" I asked wishing I could stay up to pace, but being the van still made that impossible.  
"No, we split into groups earlier, so hes somewhere else down here I think." He said.  
"Who are you with?"  
"I think they said that I'm with Matt. I really don't know. Hes a ghost." Ide laughed.  
"Well who's with Matsuda then?" I asked.  
"Oh, hes with... Um... Rose I think, and the little girl."  
"Pearl." I pointed out.  
"Aaaahh." He yelled as I heard the phone fall.  
"Ide! Ide!" Oh god this was just what I needed!! He can't have gotten into trouble as well...  
"I'm here sorry." He regathered himself sucking a breath clearly shaken by whatever had just happened, but at least he was back on the line.  
"What the hell was that!?" I barked into the phone, seriously could no one just keep it together!  
"Sorry the girl... um I mean Pearl. She just grabbed my hand, and I didn't... Well I didn't expect it was all."  
"Is she alright?" I asked, realizing even as I said it that it might seem odd to be worried about a dead kid, I mean really what could have happened to her?  
"I don't know she seems to be fine... I think... I really don't know how I would tell..." He said, right I guess that would be hard to know... "Wait shes bringing me somewhere."  
"Then go with her. I think that she might be able to help find him!" I snapped before realizing that I hadn't told him anything that was going on, god damn well he could figure it out eventually!  
"Is Matsuda missing?" See I told myself, there was a reason I kept him around besides the obvious being my friend one...  
"Just go with her!" I demanded slamming my hand down on the floor of the car.  
"Whats going on?" Lidner asked sitting down next to me.  
"We're freaking looking for them!" I snapped.  
"Sorry." She said scooting away slightly. Why the hell does no one else even seem to care about what going on here?  
"Oh wow." I heard through the phone.  
"What? Whats going on?" I called to him.  
"Theres a port." He said. "It lets out onto the river. The one that splits the city in half."  
"A port?" Great that would be an easy way to get more of us down there! Thank god at least that would mean we could try and find them that way as well! "Stay were you are. I'll be there as soon as possible."  
"Yes sir." I hung up the phone.  
"We need a boat!" I yelled to the other occupants of van and was grateful when they didn't seem to phased by this request.  
"A boat Mr. Aizawa?" Near looked at me sceptically, he didn't seem like he was going to jump up to help me find what I needed.  
"Yes theres another way into the tunnels, but I need a boat right away."  
"I don't have one." He said. "It could take quite some time to have one prepared."  
"I need one now!" I shouted, yeah he was a kid, but he was a damn adult one and could deal with it if he was not willing to help immediately when on a case!  
"Is there another way to get there like with a rope?" Gevanni asked, at least they were trying to be helpful.  
"Do we have rope?" Rester retorted.  
"I don't think so." Gevanni said looking around. "But I mean rope would be a lot easier to find then a boat. Don't you think?"  
"To do that we would need an exact location of the port." Near pointed out. "Do we have that?"  
"No." I said.  
"I have an idea." Lidner said climbing to the front seat. "I think that we are close so this should only take a minute." She started up the car, and headed down the street. The car sped through traffic until we arrived on the waterfront, at least that meant we were near the river and hopefully close to the entrance as well. People ran out of the way as Lidner pulled up onto the curb feet from a large fountain. "Come on!" She yelled as she jumped out of the car.  
"What the hell are you doing!!" I ran after her. Not that I wasn't grateful that someone was doing something even slightly proactive, but really we were on the freaking street for god sake!  
"I'm getting us a boat." She said. "I think that it was over here." A boat? Yeah there was obviously some on the waterfront but...There was no way she was going to just steal one was there?  
"You think?" I asked. She thinks she saw a boat, for rent maybe?  
"Well yeah its not like I really know were to find anything in this place." She shrugged, great, really fantastic, I was following someone equally as lost as I was!  
"Guys slow down!" Gevanni called. We both turned around as he joined us and the van pulled away into the street. "Near is staying with Rester and there trying to find somewhere that they are actually allowed to park." Cleaver, Near was more of the thinking than action type it was probably better that way.  
"Hey someone is missing we can't be worried about that type of thing."Though somewhere in my professional mind I knew it was the right thing to do, now we were split up in case something else (god forbid) was to go wrong. We had gone a good deal down the waterfront and had just reached a set of stairs that led down to a dock that housed a bunch of boats. She ran down the stairs ahead of us.  
"Where are you going?" Gevanni asked as we tried to keep up with her. "Your not going to steal one are you? Halle please tell me your not going to steal a boat?" The dark haired American called slightly desperately after his coworker.  
"Don't worry I'm not going to steal anything." She said with a suspicious smile back at us.  
"You do have a plan?" I clarified, she had better have thought this through before just barrelling down to the dock...  
"Sure." She said. Oh great that sure gives me any confidence. She finished down the stairs heels hitting the water softened wood as she continued down the wide dock, I followed behind at least she seemed sure of where she was headed. We stopped at small motor boat that a man was sitting on. "Hi there." She said. "Nice boat you have there." She twirled her hair. Oh my freaking god her plan can not really be trying to flirt herself a boat. Granted she was pretty but she didn't really come across as smooth...There was no way this was going to work out!  
"Excuse me." I said pushing in front of her. "We are going to need to borrow your boat." He raised an eyebrow at me.  
"Why?" He asked.  
"We happen to be on official police business." I said straightening up to make myself more official looking, this technique had worked before...  
"Do you have any proof." He asked. Shit. I smiled, none that would prove anything to this guy. Judging by his gruff appearance he wasn't gonna except that I was from out of the country and he just couldn't read my ID...  
"Not with me." I offered, with my edge gone I was beginning to run out of ideas. Gevanni stepped forward, maybe, just maybe, he had a plan that could really get us out of here and closer to finding my officer.  
"There is no need to lie to this man." He said smiling at us. "We are interested in buying your boat." What? We were?  
"Its not for sale." Obviously thats why hes out here sitting in like he was about to leave before we interrupted...  
"I really hope that we can change your mind." He climbed up onto the boat were the two talked in whispered voices for only a minute.  
"Alright its yours." The owner hopped down with out so much as a look back in our direction. I looked at Lidner who shrugged, then we followed up.  
"What was that?" She asked him in shock.  
"I bought it." He said with a cocky smile.  
"And you afforded it how?" She still seemed to be in disbelief, not that I blamed her, that guy hadn't been friendly no doubt this would cost a small fortune...  
"Near handed me some money. He kinda figured that you didn't have any plan. I was trying to tell you on the way, but you wouldn't share you plan with me Halle." He laughed. "And well judging by what happened I see why you weren't sharing."  
"Whatever." She said taking the wheel. "Lets just get going before we have to do anymore quick thinking." Yeah cause that was clearly not her strong point. I laughed to myself. Though as it seemed she wasn't that bad at driving a boat. Everyone has to have something they're good at I suppose...

Matsuda:

Rose and me had been locked in the interior of the boat since our capture. The two of us were still tied together, which was making her rather fidgity nothing new from her, but annoying when she was tied to your back...

"Scoot over." She said hitting me again.

"Shh." I hissed, reminding her that if we talked they were going to gag us, they had stated it pretty clearly and yet she continued on her conversation as normal.

"I know, I know." She whispered. "But I really do know what we have to do."

"Really." I rolled my eyes not wanting to hear her joke.

"I just need a few things..."

"Rose can we just skip to the punch line." I said still trying to keep as quite as I could.

"I was almost there don't worry." She smiled. "All I need is a coat hanger, bubble gum and Richard Dean Anderson." She laughed at herself. I racked my brain to try to get it, but nothing came to mind. "Really no idea?" She rolled her eyes.

"Sorry I don't get it." I said having to admit it.

"God its times like this that I really need Matt."

"Why? You think he could have gotten us out of this." She shrugged.

"Not really but he definitely would have gotten my joke, and sometimes thats just enough, you know." She turned away from me.

"Rose did you just actually say something sincere?" I joked making her blush.

"Yeah so what if I did? You want to make something of it."

"No." I laughed, it was odd how with her no mater what the situation that you are in you'll always find yourself laughing.

"Good cause I would have totally beaten the hell out of you, which would be pretty embarrassing saying as your a cop and all."

"Not at all I'd just tell all my friends that you were like some crazy big sumo wrestler."

"Like they would even believe that." She smiled cocking her head in so she was looking at me.

"They totally would."

"Says you." She challenged.

"Hey weren't we talking about you?"

"Tada." She said motioning her arms as much as she could. "I'm pretty skilled that way. I can talk circles around the best of them."

"So what were we talking about." She didn't seem to listen because she had pulled her hands up to her mouth and started to chew on the rope. "What are you doing?"

"I'm getting us out of here." She said. "These are some old ass ropes it shouldn't be that hard to break them." The ropes fell away to the ground. "Lets get the hell out of here!"

Aizawa;

I have to say that we were lucky to not be very far from the dock that we were looking for. It was in the wall surrounding the river so we nearly missed it, fortunately we managed to pull up next it and start into the opening in the wall.

"Its kinda creepy in here." Lidner said as we started into the darkened area ahead of us.

"Wait!" Gevanni called from where he was standing, still on the boat.

"Hurry up!" I shouted back. Someone was in trouble we had to do something and fast or else who knew what could happen! We don't have the time to be waiting around...

"Sorry about that." He jogged over tossing each of us a flashlight. "I just thought that these might come in handy." He said with a sideways smile, good thing he found these or else we would have been going about the whole mission pretty blindly...

"Right good thinking." I said, it wasn't easy to swallow my pride and admit that I hadn't even thought to look for a flashlight before our arrival. The three of us had only walked a short while before a chill came up my spin as a cold little hand wrapped around mine.

"Pearl?" I asked, knowing that she couldn't respond. She started to pull me back out. "Calm down." I said. "Is that where Matsuda went? Pull once if it is." The tugging came to a sudden stop followed by to short tugs. "They went that way." I informed the others indicating the way that we had just come from.

"Aizawa is that you?" I heard Mogi call.

"Yeah we're over here!" I yelled as my two men came into view. Mogi flinched as he got hit by something invisible. "Whats wrong?" I asked.

"I don't know the ghost are having some kind of a freak out." I took a few seconds to figure out what needed to be done. "Alright," I said, "so it seems that the ghost have gotten them. Is that right?" I addressed Pearl. She pulled twice. "Mogi, Ide, Gevanni you three wait here to get the buyers." They nodded. "The two ghost with you can choose what ever they want. Mello." I said knowing that he was the one that could make contact. "One hit is no, two is yes. Are you staying." Mogi flinched twice. "And the other one, is he staying." Mogi flinched once. "Alright." I nodded. "Me, Pearl, Lidner and the other ghost will head after them." Everyone nodded, and we split in to our separate groups.


End file.
